Definition and Nature of Original Sin — John Murray

Let us pray. O Lord, we bless Thy great and holy Name. Let us sin have reign unto death, even so has grace reigned through righteousness unto eternal life. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, in His Name we give Thee praise.

Amen. Dean, was this analysis of the sentence preceded with clarity as propounded by Dr. Charles Hodge? Did I, in unseemly further escalation of meditating against that analysis, derive from the Doctrine of Justification?

Did I appeal to justification in parallel? I think I did, yes. I think I did, yes. Well, that's a very important consideration. On the other side of the parallel, it isn't simply the judicial benefits of Christ's righteousness that is given to us, but the righteousness itself.

And that belongs to the kernel of the Doctrine of Justification. The righteousness is weakened. And that's why it was justified. Why? The idea of eternal life. Life. Actual weakening to overcome. Consistently one of the nests of the same kernel consideration applies on that side of the analogy.

The Imputation of Adam’s Sin and Human Solidarity

It should have been pertained to that of sin. If that is a settled datum, that we are constituted sinners by that concept, we all sin. We have to push our analysis a step further. And this is, I think, personally, a very important consideration.

Take the sin of Adam's transgression, and it involved both perversity and transgression. You remember earlier, we were dealing with the fact that before, we had to take account of the fact that Adam became depraved, and that the Orvote Act registered the perversity so involved in his sin.

So think of the sin of Adam in abstraction from the privacy of perversity. We think sin has weakened to posterity. Think of it as weakened to posterity. Conceive of the sin as anything else but by which it was characterized in the case of Adam himself.

The sin is anything else than that characterized by that which it was in the case of Adam himself. And that means that in the imputation of this sin, in other words, in the involvement of posterity in this sin, we cannot abstract this principle to a definition of sin itself.

The perversity of Adam's sin is R. N. Shale's fault. Their solidarity with Adam and their identification with his sin. Consequently, when each member of the human race comes to be of his or her existence, he or she are involved in that.

It is contemplated by God. They are destined to exist. Consequently, whenever they come to exist, in the providence of God, by natural procreation, whenever they come to exist, they come to exist as sinful and never be contemplated as anything else.

And if you are thinking of accommodation, of the soul, of spirit, of man, of the seat of his personality, by reason of this solidarity with Adam, no soul comes to be in that solidarity with Adam. Therefore, with that identification with his sin, with that involvement of the race within an entirely different perspective, infliction of the whole human race with depravity.

Very often, in reformed circles, especially maintaining immediate imputation, imputation of the sin of Adam to posterity, and that a penal consequence are inflicted with depravity. Imputation of the sin of Adam, and again, that a penal consequence are inflicted with depravity.

So, if the analysis I have presented is correct, that is not the relationship, in the very involvement, in the identification. The Asian believed of Adam, causally antecedent to the depravity, antecedent to the depravity, self-comprising relationship to Adam, the involvement of his sin with depravity, included in the sin, how it could be otherwise.

We make an artificial abstract, artificial abstract, which fails to do justice to the very nature of sin, of the not only overt with perversity. I don't think I'll say any more. Certainly, the objection which might be raised to that analysis, on the basis of the imputation of our sins to Christ, in the atonement, I deal with, I think, collectively, I'm not going to deal with that.

And that finishes my discussion of the imputation of Adam's sin. It was the second main subdivision of our formulation of the doctrine of sin, first there was the nature of sin, then the imputation of Adam's sin.

Now, remember, there are two phases and topics which we discuss with all our subdivisions. I keep them distinct because there is just a particular interest in each particular subdivision. I think the development is very important because when we come to later subdivisions, we have to depend upon something that has been demonstrated earlier under that particular interest.

We keep the subdivisions distinctly in mind, and if you are asked a question pertaining to one subject, don't answer for another subject. It would be fine if you just developed the whole thing from beginning to end, but you don't have time for that.

It's not half an hour or whatever it may be. In answering a question, answer what is precisely relevant to the question, and bear these various subdivisions in mind. Now the third main subdivision of sin.

This is the end of my lecture with the doctrine of sin.

The Meaning and Scope of Original Sin

My theology, the original sin,.

Is first of all about the denotation of this term. There is no unanimity in Reformed theology respecting the scope of original sin. Some of the Reformed theology includes in original sin three elements, namely the want of original righteousness, the imputation of Adam's first sin, the corruption of our nature, all three elements.

Stated in the short of Catechism, the guilt of original sin, the want of original righteousness, and the corruption of our whole nature. All three elements are included in original sin. Now that is quite a reasonable condition, it is quite a reasonable denotation, because that word original, original points back quite naturally to everything that occurred at the very beginning in the fall of man.

Everything that was original. The deprivation of original righteousness, the guilt of Adam's first sin, and the corruption of the whole nature. But in other Reformed theology, original sin is used more restrictively to designate what we call depravity, total depravity.

The corruption of our nature. And that seems to be the denotation applied to the term in the Westminster Standards. In Catechism again, the sinfulness of that estate where into man fell consists in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of original righteousness, and the corruption of his whole nature, which is commonly called original sin.

And the descriptive clause there, which is commonly called original sin, must refer to the corruption of his whole nature. Study the grammar, study the punctuation, that's very clearly intended. Limit the term original sin to the corruption of his whole nature.

Now, I generally follow that pattern of Westminster Standards dealing with original sin. And since I bring it in here as a distinct topic, the first would have to be that reflective denotation which would have to be in view because if the guilt of Adam's first sin is included in original sin, then it would have to have an entirely different formulation because the whole discussion of the imputation of Adam's sin would be involving the original sin.

There's no, there's no, there's no doctrine at stake here. It's purely a matter of terminology. And I'm just following for convenience sake that denotation or that definition which has come to be very common, very common.

And even in today's theology, a writer who believes in an original sin but not refers to original sin, he's terribly thinking of what is called the corruption of man's nature. Now that's what I'm going to deal with.

Total Depravity as Pervasive Hereditary Corruption

With the depravity, depravity. Now you see, we have to lay tremendous emphasis upon the implications of the sin of Adam or the whole human race. Think that this in any way depreciates the gravity of what is involved in original sin, in human depravity.

It is that which is pervasive in the human race. Of course, we can speak of hereditary depravity because the whole generation is the means by which we come to be. The means in the providence of God by which we come to be, come to be depraved.

Now, we'll come to the formulation of the doctrine. And capitally, we have the definition, the definition, the definition. Just, first of all, negatively, we claim that it is not the three things that it is.

It is not a physical being of a physical being. The older theologians used to express that truth by saying that it was not a corruption of the soul. That terminology, you'll discover the reason why. I won't use it by this time.

But nevertheless, that was the way the older theologians used to express this truth. Subsequently, by saying that it is not a corruption of man's metaphysical being. It isn't something metaphysical. Then, second, it is not the loss of a metaphysical element.

The metaphysical element in man's constitution, it is not as the dichotomous claim, the loss or dormancy of the human spirit as distinguished from the human soul and the human body, not the recession of any metaphysical element.

And as I pointed out earlier, the serious feature of sin is that the whole metaphysical being of man is involved with vote against God. That is what makes it serious. Vote of the whole personality against God.

And this depravity really consists in the end period. Vote of the whole personality against God. Depravity really consists in the end personality against God. And then, third, it is not a metaphysical element infused into the being, infused into the being.

Now, the order of theologians, again, scholastic terminology, has called it an accident, not in all senses the word accident, but an accident in the scholastic sense. And here is the order, definitions of that, that which does not subsist of itself, subsists in something else, and can be distinguished from it.

Distinguished from the definition of it. I am telling you this by saying that it is not another metaphysical element infused into the being of man. That was explained by the order of theologians by calling it an accident.

We cannot do that today because accidents have come to us in entirely different meaning. And I personally don't have a great deal of love for the old scholastic method, or the old scholastic terminology.

The Definition of Depraved Human Nature

Just pop it in the entire definition. That all descending from Adam, by ordinary generation, conceived and born, conceived and born, you are in, with a depraved nature, in consequence of which they are estranged from God in heart, disposition, mind, and will, are out of contact with the will of God, enmity with God, and are therefore utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, fully inclined to all evil.

That last part is quotation. Utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and fully inclined to all evil. Now, now that's something, that's a terrific indictment, and I don't wonder if you thought it strange, and I don't wonder if you denied that Arnold studied the biblical witness on this question, and does understand how you might readily think that that definition goes far too far.

But it doesn't allow for a great deal of the goodness which you find in even unregenerate matters. We, as Christians, have yet to discover, after all, how nice unregenerate people can be, and how helpful in society, how much they contribute to the progress of civilization.

I want you to ponder that definition, and you'll come to deal with the biblical data later on. Now, that's the definition. Now, Chapter 3, I observe all implications, nature, and origin of the definition.

Total Depravity Extends to Every Aspect of Human Nature

The name Fontaine, in terms of the definition I just gave, is the totality of this totality. The totality of the totality of it extensively and intensely and intensely is a good deal of misapprehension of what is involved in what we call total depravity.

And these two adverbs, I think, will help to elucidate what is involved. First of all, extensive. Exactly, it extends to all of our being. If there is no element, man's constitution does not come under the indictment which the definition implies.

We are thinking of man's soul, we are thinking of man on his psychical side, proper, thinking of man on his psychical side, as we speak, thinking of man on his physical side. It is not proper to say that one particular function is more rudimentary than another.

One particular function is more rudimentary than another. For example, the understanding, the understanding is more rudimentary than the habitus. The habitus is determined by the state of the understanding.

Put it the other way around, that it is the habitus that is basic, and that the understanding is determined by the direction of the habitus. It is that the intellect is, the intellective is primary, and the cognitive, secondary.

We've heard that, and we know the cognitivist and the intellectivist, that has often been, you've often heard the expression, the primacy of the intellect. We are discussing this question of relationship, in which it might be proper to speak about the primacy of the intellect, but when we are dealing with a question like this, that is basic, basic.

In the analysis of that which constitutes man's defiance, I don't believe the Bible gives us any one whatsoever function as primary or as more rudimentary having the primacy of the heart. It is believed in Hebrew or Qadian, the heart, used in that sense.

The cognitive, distinguished from the intellective, the intellective is distinguished from the cognitive. It includes the understanding, feeling, and will. You know, the three-fold addition. Understanding, feeling, and will.

And it is distinctly misleading this whole discussion. And I don't believe it has any warrant to give one the order. The truth simply no one has or finds without self-verification the primacy of the thinking of man from the physical aspect.

But again, what I have been emphasizing repeatedly, that although the body of man is not out in the world, that sums up that indictment better than all sin. Sin would be to say, therefore, that depravity extends to all aspects of being.

The Three Criteria of What Is Pleasing to God

That extends. Now, intent. It appears that misunderstanding very frequently arises. And the term total depravity is applied intent. What do we mean by wish to complete being? That there is a total lack of conformity, total lack of conformity, to the holiness and that every propension of our being, every propension, is to unholy, unworthy.

And this means that there is complete destitution, a complete lack of those criteria to the will of God and holiness determined. The three criteria of that which is good. Love to God, love to God, as the impelling motive of God, as the directing principle of the glory of God, as the controlling principle.

Very probably, there ought to be a fourth and that is the emphasis upon faith. Faith. Because without faith, it is impossible to see God at all. Every action without faith, without faith in God, must be directed by faith in God.

But I think that that is included in the other three and consequently for just for convenience sake, I make it a threefold, rather than fourfold. But I haven't been yet able to describe the most convenient way of throwing in faith and that's what I take it to be implied in these other three.

Love to God, as the impelling motive, the will of God, as the directing principle and the glory of God, as the controlling principle. Now, where these are absent, where these are absent,.

You don't have.

The Absence of God-Pleasing Motives and the Reality of Depravity

What is well-pleasing to God. And if it is not well-pleasing to God, it is disbelief that after all, for one point of the criteria, what is pleasing to God, what is not pleasing to God. Now, if there is a complete lack of love to God, if there is a complete lack of that, then you must speak in the absence of that which is well-pleasing to God.

And since there is no neutral presence of what is disbelief, and that is all and because that is what we mean, there cannot be degrees of total depravity. There cannot be degrees of total depravity. There are degrees of cultivation and exercise.

And it is there the differentiation of degrees of cultivation and exercise. There is depravity in all to the same extent, nor does it come to expression in the same person at all times. Endless degrees of exercise.