Think Wink.

This is part two of my brief review of Calvin’s discussion on original sin in his 1559 edition of the Institutes of the Christian Religion (ICR from now on in this series). In the previous post, we saw that Calvin viewed Adam’s sin as unfaithfulness to God’s Word, holding it in contempt and looking at it with unbelief, and thus in his pride and ambition, ascribed to being like God instead of remaining the position that God had allotted him. Now we turn to ICR II.i.5.

Calvin begins this discussion of sin as original by arguing from Romans 8:20, 22 that Adam’s sin corrupted all of the whole created order. Paul says in Romans 8:20-22, “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it…For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.” Calvin sees the Greek word ktisis to include not just the material creation but every part of the created order, including humanity. Humanity was “subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it.” Every part of man was subjected to this futility or “corruption” as Calvin translates it. Calvin from this text says, “Nor is it any wonder that he consigned his race to ruin by his rebellion when he perverted the whole order of nature in heaven and on earth…If the cause is sought, there is now doubt that they are bearing part of the punishment deserved by man, for whose use they were created. Since, therefore, the curse, which goes about through all the regions of the world, flowed hither and yon from Adam’s guilt, it is not unreasonable if it is spread to all his offspring.”

Calvin goes on to argue, “Therefore after the heavenly image was obliterated in him, he was not the only one to suffer this punishment–that, in place of wisdom, virtue, holiness, truth, and justice, with which adornments he had been clad, there came forth the most filthy plagues, blindness, impotence, impurity, vanity, and injustice–but he also entangled and immersed his offspring in the same misery. This is the inherited corruption, which the church fathers termed ‘original sin,’ meaning by the word ‘sin’ the depravation of a nature previously good and pure.” Calvin is not saying that Adam’s sin or guilt is given to mankind. Rather Calvin is saying that the image in which God made man was shattered by Adam’s sin. He doesn’t, here, define sin as what we would normal define sin as–namely a willful violation of the will and purpose of God–but rather as a depravation of our nature that was once good. The wisdom and virtue etc. that God bestowed Adam’ with has been corrupted into plague and blindness etc. This corruption was spread to all of creation, including mankind. Mankind was not excluded from God’s judgment to curse the creation with the corruption of Adam. Mankind was affected, corrupted, by the Fall.

After commenting on Pelegius and Coelestius and their view of Romans 5:12 as sin was passed onto following generations by imitation, he moved into Psalm 51:5 and David’s profession, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” Calvin comments on this confession of David, “Surely there is no doubt that David confesses himself to have been ‘begotten in iniquities, and conceived by his mother in sin.’ There he does not reprove his father and mother for their sins; but, that he may better commend God’s goondess to himself, from his very conception he carries the confession of his own perversity. Since it is clear that this was not peculiar to David, it follows that the common lot of mankind is exemplified in him.”

Thus to sum up Calvin’s argument he says in conjunction with Job 14:4, “Therefore all of us who have descended from impure seed, are born infected with the contagion of sin. In fact, before we saw the light of this life we were soiled and spotted in God’s sight. ‘For who can bring a clean thing from an unclean? There is not one’–as the Book of Job says.”

Calvin and Original Sin: Part 7

Calvin and Original Sin: Part 6

Calvin and Original Sin: Part 5