Original Sin

[Myhrr]

Matt16_18:

Some members of the Orthodox Church will tell you that the Orthodox don’t believe in original sin. If you run into that, ask if the Orthodox teach that all men and women are immaculately conceived.

Indeed, in guilt I was born, and in sin my mother conceived me.

Psalm 51:7 (New American Bible)

The New American Bible isn’t Orthodox and this verse has never been understood by the Orthodox as the RCC doctrine has used it.

This is Psalm 50 in the Orthodox Bible Septuagint (the Orthodox have an extra Psalm).

The Orthodox Study Bible doesn’t follow the LXX form, but says this:

"51 (50 LXX) This is a psalm of repentance and God’s mercy, and a prophecy about the salvation through baptism (vv. 2,7). It is also a teaching about worship in spirit (vv 17-19). Of all 150 psalms, this is the one most used in the Orthodox Church. It is a psalm of repentance said three times daily - Matins, Third Hour, and Compline - as well as in every Divine Liturgy, where it is recited by the priest as a sign of repentance while he censes before the Great Enterance. Historically, this psalm is David’s prayer of confession after his sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam,. 12:1-15).

Verse 5 is clarified in the LXX: "Behold I was brought forth in iniquities and in sins (plural) did my mother conceive me." Far from seeing conception and childbirth as sinful in themselves, or as a means of passing on Adam’s guilt, this passage tells us every action in this fallen world is accomplished by sinful people in sinful circumstances.

This psalm is a liturgical deposit of gold in the Church, prayed by clergy and laity, expressing the most basic things that need to be said by the faithful before their God. It is best learned and understood through its use in prayer."

NB clergy and laity do not have the same meanings in the Orthodox Church as in the RCC.

 

[MariaG]

Myhrr,I started the new thread Is the pope the head of the church or is Christ? here in non Catholic religions forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=11887
I look forward to a discussion.
Maria

 

[Matt16_18]

Myhrr:

The Orthodox Study Bible doesn’t follow the LXX form, but says this: … Verse 5 is clarified in the LXX: "Behold I was brought forth in iniquities and in sins (plural) did my mother conceive me." Far from seeing conception and childbirth as sinful in themselves, or as a means of passing on Adam’s guilt, this passage tells us every action in this fallen world is accomplished by sinful people in sinful circumstances.

Do you agree that the Orthodox do NOT teach that men and women are immaculately conceived?

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

Matt16_18:

Do you agree that the Orthodox do NOT teach that men and women are immaculately conceived?

The Fathers speak of what they call, usually, “ancestral sin” or original (in the sense of “the first”) sin in terms of the withdrawal of the divine life from mankind. When the Orthodox speak then of the ancestral sin, so often called “original sin” in the West, what we are speaking of is nothing less than the mortality of soul and body and thus the corruption of the image. We are NOT meaning any actual “sin” or “guilt” passed on through each generation, but we mean what has resulted from the original sin - death and sickness and, in short, the loss of communion with the divine, the expulsion from paradise which was closed to us.

So this is why any teaching on the Immaculate Conception has no place in Orthodoxy. It just doesn’t make sense; it just has no place to fit. Mary the Mother of God was conceived with the same amount of ancestral “sin,” no more and no less, than you and I. She was born with no escape from death, like you and I, she was prone to sickness, to temptation, like you and I. Saint John Chrysostom even teaches that she did fall into personal sin, although the Orthodox today would be very reluctant to say such a thing.

I’ve done a quick web search looking for articles more eloquent than my own stumbling words. This article by Fr John Romanides popped up, and although I have not yet read it, his expression of theology is always spot on.

"Original sin according to Saint Paul"
biblical-theology.com/originalsin/paul.htm

 

[Matt16_18]

Fr Ambrose:

The Fathers speak of what they call, usually, “ancestral sin” or original (in the sense of “the first”) sin in terms of the withdrawal of the divine life from mankind.

IOW, since the Fall, humans are born in a dis-graced condition.

Do Orthodox believe that infants receive sanctifying grace through the Sacrament of Baptism?

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

Matt16_18:

Do Orthodox believe that infants receive sanctifying grace through the Sacrament of Baptism?

The great Mystery of Baptism serves to open the doors to the Kingdom of grace. The Kingdom of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

A person baptized in water is buried with Christ and raised to life in Him and is incorporated into His life.

A person baptized is anointed with the sacred Chrism and in the Chrism the Holy Spirit takes us His dwelling in him or her.

A person baptized is fed with the divine Body and Blood of Christ and given the food of eternal life.

Is this what you have in mind by sanctifying grace? It is not a term used by the Orthodox who tend to see grace as, well, grace. Grace is God Himself in His energies. Through His grace/energies He reaches out beyond His unknowable and untouchable essence and touches us with His divinity.

 

[Matt16_18]

Fr Ambrose:

Is this what you have in mind by sanctifying grace?

Yes, this is exactly what I had in mind.

[Sanctifying grace] is not a term used by the Orthodox who tend to see grace as, well, grace. Grace is God Himself in His energies. Through His grace/energies He reaches out beyond His unknowable and untouchable essence and touches us with His divinity.

I can’t find anyplace on the web where the Orthodox define the distinction between God’s “energy” and God’s “essence”. As best I can figure out, the Orthodox are making the same distinction between energy and essence that the Catholic make when they talk about created grace and uncreated grace.

 

[Matt16_18]

Fr Ambrose:

A person baptized is anointed with the sacred Chrism and in the Chrism the Holy Spirit takes us His dwelling in him or her.

Oops, I would disagree with this. The Sacrament of Baptism brings the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to the Christian.

Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, `You must be born anew.’ The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.”
John 3:5-8

 

[Myhrr]

Matt16_18:

Do you agree that the Orthodox do NOT teach that men and women are immaculately conceived?

I think we both need to go back to the beginning of each other’s viewpoints to avoid talking at cross purposes.

I understand where you’re coming from to the limits of my ability from reading RCC explanations, I’m more than happy for you to correct me if I show any error in representing your doctrines.

For my understanding of Orthodox doctrine I say the same, Father Ambrose I’m more than happy to be corrected by you, or any other Orthodox here. Caveat - doesn’t mean I except your understanding as definitive…

However, as I don’t speak for the RCC or the Orthodox Church in or out of communion with the EP I prefer not to be pinned down to arguments that are thought of as being from one or the other.

So, I agree, in answer to your question, that the Orthodox do not teach that men and women are immaculately conceived - because they don’t have any doctrines defining ‘immaculate’. Immaculate as you understand it is solely an RCC doctrinal term. It means without the inherited guilt of original sin which lost Adam and Eve sanctifying grace, etc. which doctrine the Orthodox don’t have.

I’d like to go back to the beginning of RCC doctrine here. I think all the doctrines about original sin, its effects and consequences, and such doctrines which are based on it, without sanctifying grace, immaculate conception etc., come from the description of Adam and Eve from a beginning as described in Genesis II where Adam was created first and then the rest and then as an afterthought, Eve.

I’m suggesting this because Augustine refused to consider all arguments that suggested God created male and female and blessed them to procreate in a natural world such as we live in now, he insisted that the creation of man excluded physical death.

To understand the dogma of original sin according to the RCC we must remember they say Adam and Eve were immortal full stop.

From New Advent under Original Sin

Theodorus of Mopsuestia opened this controversy by denying that the sin of Adam was the origin of death. (See the “Excerpta Theodori”, by Marius Mercator; cf. Smith, “A Dictionary of Christian Biography”, IV, 942.) Celestius, a friend of Pelagius, was the first in the West to hold these propositions, borrowed from Theodorus: “Adam was to die in every hypothesis, whether he sinned or did not sin. His sin injured himself only and not the human race” newadvent.org/cathen/11312a.htm

All those objections to the base of RCC doctrines on original sin are those still voiced by the Orthodox.

Orthodox doctrine refers back to Genesis I in which man, male and female, were created in the image and likeness of God. From Brenton’s Septuagint which I have handy:

26 And God said, Let us make man according to our image and likeness, etc.

27 And God made man, according to the image of God he made him, male and female he made them. (Matthew 19:4)

28 And God blessed them, saying Increase and multiply,etc.

Man and Woman created as the height of creation after God created the natural world and placed in the natural world, where we have been given natural food to eat and where we to eat to live.

continued

 

[Myhrr]

continued to Matt16_18

My last point to the above will also be the beginning of my second argument against the RCC doctrines of Original Sin, as infallibly defined - Augustine’s reading of Genesis III, which according to the RCC is not to be examined in relation to Adam’s sin: “As to the sin of Adam we have not to examine the circumstances in which it was committed nor make the exegesis of the third chapter of Genesis.”

Brenton’s Septuagint says:

Genesis III

**4 **but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

5 And the serpent said to the woman, Ye shall not surely die. *

• The note here is: Gr. ye shall not die by death.

But they did eat it and 23 God said, Behold, Adam is become as one of us, to know good and evil, and now lest at any time he stretch forth his hand, and take of the tree of life and eat, and so he shall live for ever - 24 So the Lord God sent him forth out of the garden of Delight to cultivate the ground out of which he was taken.

Since Adam hadn’t eaten of the tree of life which gave eternal life before he was sent out of the garden by God, the RCC dogma that Adam’s sin brought physical death isn’t proved.

To remind, me especially, what I’m arguing against. From Pope John Paul II’s Summary of Catchesis on Original Sin, above.

IV 5. Our first parents (the Decree says: Primum hominem Adam), in the earthly paradise (and therefore in the state of original justice and perfection) sinned gravely by transgressing the commandment of God. Because of their sin they lost santifying grace; likewise they lost also the holiness and justice in which they were “constituted” from the beginning, drawing down upon themselves the anger of God. The consequence of this sin was death as we now know it …

My second argument against the RCC’s Original Sin is Augustine’s actual reading of 23 which is as JPII explained in IV 5.

Septuagint

**4 **but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
From

Augustine has misread this explanation of God’s, don’t or you’ll die, as ‘don’t, or I’ll kill you’, a punishment for disobedience from an angry God.

The Orthodox don’t recognise this God of the RCC.

The River of Fire By: Alexander Kalomiros

But what was the instrument of the devil’s slandering of God? What means did he use in order to convince humanity, in order to pervert human thought?

He used ‘theology’. He first introduced a slight alteration in theology which, once it was accepted, he managed to increase more and more to the degree that Christianity became completely unrecognisable. This is what we call ‘Western theology’.

Did you ever try to p(name removed by moderator)oint what is the principal characteristic of Western theology? Well, its principal characteristic is that it considers God as the real cause of all evil. What is evil? Is it not the estrangement from God Who is Life?(1)1 Is it not death? What does Western theology teach about death? All Roman Catholics and most Protestants consider death as a punishment from God. God considered all men guilty of Adam’s sin and punished them by death, that is by cutting them away from Himself; depriving them of His live giving energy, and so killing them spiritually at first and later bodily, by some sort of spiritual starvation. Augustine interprets the passage in Genesis ‘If you eat of the fruit of this tree, you will die the death’ as ‘If you eat of the fruit of this tree, I will kill you’

There are other arguments, but from the above the RCC doctrine of Original Sin is not supported by Genesis.

 

[Myhrr]

P.S.

NB about that link. It has a question mark, ?, where there should be inverted commas, so not easily read, a google search will get you an easier copy if you want. And p.p.s to Father Ambrose, it just happened to be the first of several bookmarks of the River of Fire scattered around my favourites links not deliberately chosen to offend you, but I decided not to look for another one, I like the site, I have enormous sympathy for Metropolitan Vitaly .

 

[Matt16_18]

Myhrr

All I can say is that if the Orthodox do believe that Adam’s disobedience to God did NOT bring death to himself and to his progeny, then they have a very confused understanding of scriptures.
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”
Gen. 2: 16-17
Let me try and help you understand what Catholics believe. Imagine that you could see the light of grace shining in a soul. In the fallen world, before a person receives the Sacrament of Baptism there is no light of grace shining from the soul. After the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism, one would see the brilliant light of the Holy Spirit that indwells in the soul of the newly baptized person. As best that I can understand the Orthodox, I think that the Orthodox would say that that one would see the Energies of God illuminating the soul of the newly baptized.

Adam and Eve had sanctifying grace in their souls before the Fall. The sanctifying grace of original justice was NOT the same thing as the indwelling of the Holy Spirit - it was an unmerited grace that bestowed holiness upon them, but it was not the sanctifying grace that is possessed by the blessed in Heaven.

Adam and Eve were destined to receive the Uncreated Grace of the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but they never saw what they had been destined for. Their disobedience to the expressed will of God resulted in their being expelled from the Terrestrial Paradise, lest they eat of the Tree of Life. (The Tree of Life is a type that finds its antitype in the Eucharist).

Adam and Eve lost the supernatural gift of sanctifying grace of Original Justice because of their disobedience to God, and their sin plunged their souls into the darkness of a dis-graced state. This disgraced state brought death into the world, and that cannot be denied by the Orthodox unless they also deny what is written in scriptures. (See Romans 5:12-19).

 

[RBushlow]

Myhrr:

. . . . The River of Fire By: Alexander Kalomiros . . .
All Roman Catholics and most Protestants consider death as a punishment from God. God considered all men guilty of Adam’s sin and punished them by death, that is by cutting them away from Himself; depriving them of His live giving energy, and so killing them spiritually at first and later bodily, by some sort of spiritual starvation.
. . . . .

Myhrr, This is a bit off-topic but I’m curious about a couple of things. You mention that Catholics see Serious sin as separating man from God. How does the Orthodox Church see Serious sin and it’s effects? Do you distinguish Serious sin, what we call Mortal sin? Is there no teaching of hell? As you probably know, we have the Sacrement of Reconciliation or Penance for the forgiveness of sin. I always thought that the Orthodox have the same seven Sacrements, is this incorrect? Thank you.

 

[GAssisi]

Dear Myrrh,

The problem with Orthodox polemics on this issue, and apparently your own presentation, is that it lumps “Western Christianity” into one body, without distinguishing the errors of Protestants from the genuine patristic and biblical teaching of the Catholic Church.

The supposed sticking point between Catholics and Orthodox on this issue - i.e., the imputation of the guilt of Adam’s original sin on all humanity - is not actually a difference between Catholics and Orthodox, but between Catholics/Orthodox and Protestants. The idea of the imputation of the guilt of Adam’s original sin is NOT a CATHOLIC idea, but the CALVINIST HERESY - a misreading of the Augustine. Polemic (and I daresay uninformed) Orthodox fail or refuse to recognize this distinction and lump BOTH Catholics and Protestants under “Western theology,” when in fact Catholics read Augustine very differently from the way Protestants read him.

So your presentation of Catholic doctrine VIA Alexander Kalomiros is unfair since he is obviously working under the false pretenses I have already stated - i.e., confusing Catholic teaching with Protestant heresy (which apparently you are doing as well).

Two more points: First, official Catholic teaching DOES NOT state that God killed Adam and Eve or the human race, but that Adam and Eve, and all humans thereafter, have consigned THEMSELVES to death by their disobedience. God does not wish for anyone to die; we bring the consequences on ourselves of our own volition. Others with more time than I have will surely give you documentary evidence for this.

Second, the Orthodox readily agree, contrary to your assertion, that Adam’s sin did indeed bring physical death into this world. Ask Father Ambrose, and any Eastern Catholic in this forum.

God bless,
Greg

 

[Myhrr]

Myhrr

All I can say is that if the Orthodox do believe that Adam’s disobedience to God did NOT bring death to himself and to his progeny, then they have a very confused understanding of scriptures. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.” Gen. 2: 16-17

So how do you get an angry God from that?

Consequence. You shall die. How? Were they immortal? NO. They hadn’t eaten from the tree of life, they were already mortal.

Let me try and help you understand what Catholics believe. Imagine that you could see the light of grace shining in a soul. In the fallen world, before a person receives the Sacrament of Baptism there is no light of grace shining from the soul

Where does that come from? This total absence of grace. Where in Scripture?

After the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism, one would see the brilliant light of the Holy Spirit that indwells in the soul of the newly baptized person.

What one would see or not see is subjective. Your dogma is that Adam lost all God’s grace and this is nowhere to be found in Holy Scripture, that I know of, correct me if I’m wrong.

As best that I can understand the Orthodox, I think that the Orthodox would say that that one would see the Energies of God illuminating the soul of the newly baptized.

Oh, please, don’t. The Orthodox mean something very specific by that and it is not what you mean by grace. The terms are not interchangeable. The Orthodox do not mean sanctifying grace as the RCC has defined it.

Adam and Eve had sanctifying grace in their souls before the Fall.The sanctifying grace of original justice was NOT the same thing as the indwelling of the Holy Spirit - it was an unmerited grace that bestowed holiness upon them, but it was not the sanctifying grace that is possessed by the blessed in Heaven.

Which is what you mean by sanctifying grace, an unmerited gift of something called grace which God created for man, right? So now you’re saying that it’s not sanctifying grace that’s replaced at baptism but the Holy Spirit? So they don’t get back sanctifying grace? that’s not de fide.

Adam and Eve were destined to receive the Uncreated Grace of the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but they never saw what they had been destined for. Their disobedience to the expressed will of God resulted in their being expelled from the Terrestrial Paradise, lest they eat of the Tree of Life. (The Tree of Life is a type that finds its antitype in the Eucharist).

OK, please, since when has the RCC talked in terms of Uncreated Grace? Since Paul VI? Where has the RCC said this in any of its doctrines of Original Sin? The RCC has said that baptism infuses with sanctifying grace, which the RCC has made clear, is what has been lost because of Adam’s disobedience, and that baptism is the only way it can be replaced, and of course that only they etc.

The RCC has argued against the Orthodox doctrines on Uncreated Grace, you’re now mixing your own beliefs with a smidgin of something that you’ve rejected and created something else again.

Maybe Father Ambrose can sort this out… :banghead:

continued

 

[Myhrr]

Continued to

Adam and Eve lost the supernatural gift of sanctifying grace of Original Justice because of their disobedience to God, and their sin plunged their souls into the darkness of a dis-graced state. This disgraced state brought death into the world, and that cannot be denied by the Orthodox unless they also deny what is written in scriptures. (See Romans 5:12-19).

Now you’re back to supernatural sanctifying grace - So how is the Holy Spirit’s indwelling different from that?

Sin. For the RCC sin is what Adam gained by loss of sanctifying grace, putting him in a state of sinfulness utterly without God’s friendship, which grace his descendants get back at baptism.

And note, “sin entered the world” is not saying the same as “utterly outside of God’s friendship” and “in a state of sinfulness” “with inclination to sin”. Your doctrine makes everyone a graceless sinner, and dead.

Look, I’ll have to come back to this because I can’t sort out what you’ve done to your own de fide doctrines here… and, I only have the Orthodox Study Bible to hand which is a bit corrupt for Orthodoxy.

 

[GAssisi]

Dear Myrrh,

Once again, you seem to be confusing Catholic teaching with the Calvinist/Protestant heresy. The Catholic Church does NOT teach that our nature has been TOTALLY corrupted (or “dead”). What you are presenting as Catholic doctrine is actually the Protestant heresy of total depravity. The Catholic Church teaches that our nature was INJURED, greviously indeed, but it was not corrupted to such an extent that we are wholly “dead” in the eyes of God.

Please do more study of Catholic doctrine before making your rather uninformed comments.

God bless,
Greg

 

[Myhrr]

RBushlow:

Myhrr, This is a bit off-topic but I’m curious about a couple of things. You mention that Catholics see Serious sin as separating man from God. How does the Orthodox Church see Serious sin and it’s effects? Do you distinguish Serious sin, what we call Mortal sin? Is there no teaching of hell? As you probably know, we have the Sacrement of Reconciliation or Penance for the forgiveness of sin. I always thought that the Orthodox have the same seven Sacrements, is this incorrect? Thank you.

The Orthodox don’t have your understanding of sin full stop. I’m not the best to explain it especially here where Matt16-18 has hijacked a term, Uncreated Grace, which has been categorically rejected by the RCC, but I’d have to refresh my memory on the history of this.

The Orthodox Church is a Sacramental Church, the 7 Sacraments as the RCC have it defined were an introduction into Orthodoxy, um, maybe it was Peter the Great who had a great love for all things Western that introduced it first, maybe it was the Greeks at some point, anyway, it doesn’t really mean anything to the Orthodox, the whole work of the Church,ekklesia, is Sacramental.

This is an explanation of Orthodox understanding of Uncreated Energy, the base from which creation is understood, not to be confused with Matt16-18’s explanation.

**–If you premise that Grace is uncreated Energy (as do the Orthodox), then you will reject the JURIDICAL (satisfaction, atonement, justification, etc.) and of course non-ontological soteriology of Western Christians: You will accept that a worshiper benefits from what Christ God did because s/he shares God’s uncreated Life or uncreated Energies–so that what Christ has done is theirs (yours), and what they (you) do under the Energization of the all-holy Spirit (Philp. 2:13 in GREEK) is Christ’s–and hence soterial! **

From orlapubs.com

There isn’t this ‘division’ in God’s creation of man that exists in the RCC doctrines, I don’t recall off-hand the exact wording of how you explain it, but you say that God created man then gave him this gift of sanctifying grace, something created for man to be able to live with God, sonship, subservience.

I’ll have a look for an easy explanation of the Orthodox, we’re created of the uncreated energies of God is my best effort.

 

[Myhrr]

GAssisi:

Dear Myrrh,

Once again, you seem to be confusing Catholic teaching with the Calvinist/Protestant heresy. The Catholic Church does NOT teach that our nature has been TOTALLY corrupted (or “dead”). What you are presenting as Catholic doctrine is actually the Protestant heresy of total depravity. The Catholic Church teaches that our nature was INJURED, greviously indeed, but it was not corrupted to such an extent that we are wholly “dead” in the eyes of God.

Please do more study of Catholic doctrine before making your rather uninformed comments.

God bless,
Greg

Greg, I’ve been going through this with GrzeszDeL in this discussion, but which started in the discussion on the Immaculate Conception.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=10930

I should be grateful if you’d read through these exchanges first, and, my arguments aren’t with the Protestants, this isn’t their board, so I think we’d need to be careful bringing their beliefs into this.

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

Matt16_18:

Oops, I would disagree with this. The Sacrament of Baptism brings the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to the Christian.

Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit,

Precisely. One is reborn in the water of Bapstim ansd then one is immediately chismated with the oil of Chrism which is the Holy Spirit. Water **AND **Spirit.

The Lord was baptized in the river Jordan and then straighaway the Spirit descended on Him. A twofold action within the one event. Water and Spirit. Baptism and Chrismation.

It is one reason why an Orthodox Baptism is composed of actually three Mysteries - Baptism, Chrismation, and Eucharist. The RCs have been returning to his concept of Baptism with the new approach to the reception of catechumens. It’s not new really - it is the ancient and orthodox way. One has only to read the commentaries on Baptism by such as Saint Cyril of Jerusalem. Point by point identical to a contemporary Orthodox Baptism and Chrismation, and the new Catholic ways are getting very close to them also. We rejoice in your recovery of your ancient heritage. It is making the ecumenical dialogue so much easier.