The Fall of Humanity

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The Cosmic Trial

Romans 5:12–21 NASB95
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned— for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come. But the free gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. The gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification. For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Three States

Adam was originally created with the ability to sin or not to sin. He could do either one.
If Adam passes the probationary period, his ability to not sin and his inability to sin would have been established forever.
If Adam failed: he would lose the ability to not sin.
Adam failed the probationary period, losing his ability
If Adam passed: he would become unable to sin.
Genesis 3:23–24 NASB95
therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.
Genesis 3:22–24 NASB95
Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.
Genesis 3:24 NASB95
So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.
Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century VI. The Fall of Mankind, and Sin and Its Punishment

6:1 God created humanity upright and perfect. He gave them a righteous law that would have led to life if they had kept it but threatened death if they broke it. Yet they did not remain for long in this position of honor. Satan used the craftiness of the serpent to seduce Eve, who then seduced Adam. Adam acted without any outside compulsion and deliberately transgressed the law of their creation and the command given to them by eating the forbidden fruit.2 God was pleased, in keeping with His wise and holy counsel, to permit this act, because He had purposed to direct it for His own glory.

Verdict and Sentence: Solidarity in Adam

Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century VI. The Fall of Mankind, and Sin and Its Punishment

6:2 By this sin our first parents fell from their original righteousness and communion with God. We fell in them, and through this, death came upon all. All became dead in sin4 and completely defiled in all the capabilities and parts of soul and body.

Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century VI. The Fall of Mankind, and Sin and Its Punishment

6:3 By God’s appointment, they were the root and the representatives of the whole human race. Because of this, the guilt of their sin was accounted, and their corrupt nature passed on, to all their offspring who descended from them by ordinary procreation. Their descendants are now conceived in sin7 and are by nature children of wrath, the servants of sin, and partakers of death9 and all other miseries—spiritual, temporal, and eternal—unless the Lord Jesus sets them free.

1 Corinthians 15:21–22 NASB95
For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.
1 cor. 15 21 22
What did Pelagian teach?
Adam’s offspring is unaffected by the fall. Man is still free to obey God or not obey God in the same fashion Adam was.
What is the distinguishing factor of Semi-Pelagianism?
Man is not free to obey God or not obey God but man can make the first move toward God. Man is not free to do good in his fallen nature but he is at least able to come to God on his own strength.
How is Arminianism different from Pelagianism?
Classical Arminianism says that prevenient grace is extended at the preaching of the gospel and men are enabled at that moment to respond positively to Christ. Classic Arminianism was quickly replaced by the view that the effects of the fall in Adam are universally reversed in Christ at Calvary. This amounts to a practical denial of original sin.
The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way 1. Testimony to the Covenant of Creation from Non-christian Sources

1. TESTIMONY TO THE COVENANT OF CREATION FROM NON-CHRISTIAN SOURCES

Along with its creation story (Enuma Elish), ancient Babylonian civilization produced the Code of Hammurabi, which bears striking resemblance to the Ten Commandments delivered to Moses centuries later. In fact, it was probably under King Hammurabi (1792–1750 BC) that the Enuma Elish poem was commissioned.

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way 2. Testimony to the Covenant of Creation from Christian Sources

Reformation theology emphasizes that while the gospel is revealed only in the proclamation of Christ (verbum externum), the law is the native property of all human beings (verbum internum), the very law of their being which, though suppressed in unrighteousness, cannot entirely be purged from the conscience.

What was the Catholic view?

Adam’s sustenance—and therefore that of the created order—depended at every moment not on the integrity of freedom in created righteousness, but on a donum superadditum—a gift of grace added to nature, elevating p 422 it toward the supernatural.

By contrast, the Reformers taught that both the integrity of human nature and its depravity after the fall were total, encompassing the mind as well as the body, the soul as well as its passions, the intellect and senses alike. The fall cannot be attributed to humanity’s having been “ensnared by the inferior appetites,” says Calvin, “but abominable impiety has seized the very citadel of his mind, and pride has penetrated into the inmost recesses of his heart; so that it is weak and foolish to restrict the corruption which has proceeded thence to what are called the sensual appetites.”

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way B. The Sanctions of the Covenant: Original Sin

“Original sin” is the term that the Western church has employed to refer to our collective human guilt and corruption. No doctrine is more crucial to our anthropology and soteriology, and yet no doctrine has been more relentlessly criticized ever since it was articulated. Protestant liberalism has always had an optimistic view of human morality. Adolf von Harnack called original sin “an impious and foolish dogma.” That, however, was before two world wars, to which Harnack’s own contribution should not be forgotten

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way B. The Sanctions of the Covenant: Original Sin

However, if one does not take Adam (i.e., the human as human) seriously, two serious problems ensue: first, sin must be attributed to creation itself (and therefore ultimately to the Creator); second, there is no longer any historical basis for Christ’s work as the Last Adam, undoing the curse and fulfilling the terms of the covenant of creation.

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way B. The Sanctions of the Covenant: Original Sin

A covenantal account of original sin focuses on the representative, federal, covenantal structure of human existence before God. Like a nation represented by the decrees and actions of its head of state, the human race is one-in-many and many-in-one. As goes the king, so goes the kingdom. To be sure, there are metaphysical and ontological consequences of covenant transgression, such as human death as the judicial sentence, but the essence of sin itself is legal, forensic, and ethical: “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law” (1 Co 15:56).

The Permanence of the Image

The image of God is properly functioning when yielding common testimony to God’s character, will, works, and ways. Furthermore, it is in the church and as the church that the new humanity is being justified and sanctified, anticipating the day when it will be glorified together with its risen head. It is in the church as the community of the covenant of grace that the powers of the age to come break in on this present evil age, beginning already to make all things new.

“Thus the image of God,” for Eastern Orthodoxy as opposed to Lutheran and Reformed orthodoxy, “is both ontic and actual, and it is viewed in a manner which relates it closely to a semi-Pelagian view of man’s will.” Nevertheless, Lutheran theology teaches that the image of God was lost in the fall, while Reformed theology teaches that it remains, albeit marred, disfigured, and corrupted in every way. Or at least this is a common contrast that is drawn, usually on the Reformed side.

James 3:9 NASB95
With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God;
Genesis 9:6 NASB95
“Whoever sheds man’s blood, By man his blood shall be shed, For in the image of God He made man.
Gen

Stay of Execution

Creation was but the origin. The destination was the Tree of Life, with humanity confirmed in everlasting glory, immortality, and righteousness. “That door, however, was never opened,” notes Kline.

It was not the Fall in itself that delayed the consummation. According to the conditions of the covenant of creation the prospective consummation was either/or. It was either eternal glory by covenantal confirmation of original righteousness or eternal perdition by covenant-breaking repudiation of it. The Fall, therefore, might have been followed at once by a consummation of the curse of the covenant. The delay was due rather to the principle and purpose of divine compassion by which a new way of arriving at the consummation was introduced, the way of redemptive covenant with common grace as its historical corollary.

The ensuing biblical narrative does not attempt to produce either a comprehensive chronology or a comprehensive genealogy but rather hits the highlights of redemptive history between Adam and Abraham.

By decentralizing the power, wealth, population, and technology through linguistic differentiation, instead of destroying the city, God restrained the devastating potential of evil. All of this is meant to introduce us to the line of Noah, Shem, and Terah, father of Abram.

Isreal, My Beloved: Between the Two Adams

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way V. “Israel, My Beloved”: Between the Two Adams

So decisive is the call of Abraham in Genesis 12 that it initiates the history of Israel and renders all that has preceded it a mere prologue to that story. In fact, Bavinck goes so far as to conclude that special revelation begins with the call of Abraham. Redemptive history begins now to move swiftly toward the Messiah, first by type and shadow and then, in the fullness of time, in reality.

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way V. “Israel, My Beloved”: Between the Two Adams

We cannot find this gospel in nature, creation, reason, or conscience: “It is an historical product; the initiative came from God; he so reveals himself as, by the act of revelation, to receive a particular person and people into communion with himself.”

The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way V. “Israel, My Beloved”: Between the Two Adams

As Adam had been cast out of the garden, Israel was exiled by none other than Yahweh himself, the suzerain whose treaty had been reduced to shattered tablets by his covenant partner. “Like Adam they transgressed the covenant”

Hosea 6:7 NASB95
But like Adam they have transgressed the covenant; There they have dealt treacherously against Me.
Jeremiah 33:23–26 NASB95
And the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, saying, “Have you not observed what this people have spoken, saying, ‘The two families which the Lord chose, He has rejected them’? Thus they despise My people, no longer are they as a nation in their sight. “Thus says the Lord, ‘If My covenant for day and night stand not, and the fixed patterns of heaven and earth I have not established, then I would reject the descendants of Jacob and David My servant, not taking from his descendants rulers over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But I will restore their fortunes and will have mercy on them.’ ”
The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way V. “Israel, My Beloved”: Between the Two Adams

But how will God be faithful to both covenants, to the law and the gospel? How will he be “just and the justifier” (Ro 3:26)? It will be by causing his own Son, the Last Adam and True Israel, to fulfill all righteousness and yet to pass through the judgment—cut off from the land of the living—for our sins, so that his righteousness becomes definitive for the solidarity of his new creation in and with him. Our focus now turns, therefore, from the dark night of human rebellion to this sunrise of the Messiah: the one who comes as Lord and Servant of the everlasting covenant.

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