Are we prisoners of sin

Good reply ICANT indeed Adam had received a direct warning straight out of the horses mouth (Gen 2:16), and despite this clear-cut warning he still managed to disobeyed. Eve had not heard it from God directly, because in her reason to Satan not to eat the fruit she misquoted God in a handful of ways.(Gen 2:17; Gen 3:3) To make it worse Adam was there standing right next to Eve (Gen 3:6) and didnt bother to warn her against eating the fruit or to stop her from listening to the father of lies and what's more he too ate of the tree. Now concerning Jesus and whether or not he too was born with the same sinful nature that the rest of mankind is known for. Jesus was simply implanted into Mary's womb like you were to slip a letter into an envelope. He has nothing of Mary's because to have had any of her traits including sin he would have been formed via fertilisation.

Then, being fully God and not of man, what connection to man would Jesus have that allowed him to take on the sins of man? Wasn't the entire point to have Jesus be a man and not a god? You need to back that statement up. In other areas of the Bible such differences are explained away by differences in phrasing, translation, or the narration method of the writer. It is quite the leap to assume that because the quote is not word-for-word that Eve was not told by God not to eat from the tree; after all, she got the gist of the idea correct. In any case if she was not told to avoid the tree then why would God punish her for eating from it? I am familiar with the Christian accepted godly douchbaggery, but that is pretty cold.

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1: Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
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4: And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
5: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

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They had no reason to mistrust the serpent. After all, the "father of lies" had done nothing wrong in the history of existence. Which brings me to my other point: God is punishing Adam and Eve unfairly.Sure, God warned them not to eat the fruit, but before eating the fruit Adam and Eve were incapable of recognizing the difference between good and evil! God punishes them not just with the necessary curse and blessings of free will, but also *spitefully* by increasing the pain of childbirth for Eve, and the pain of labor and eating dirt for Adam.

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22: And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
23: Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

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God states specifically that his intent is to keep man from attaining eternal life. Why then would you possibly believe that he bent over backwards trying to provide an easy method for attaining such a thing? If you believe such a story then you must conclude that God is your enemy; it is he and his Cherubim with flaming swords that stand between you and eternal life, not his approval.

Here we go: xians believing that deep, deep down we all believe what they believe.Is there no end to xian arrogance?

First of all, I thank Larni for bringing my attention to this comment.Cedre, you remind me of a member here long ago. I can't remember his name off the top of my head now. In one of our debates, I and some others asked him if god was just for throwing people who had never heard of god down to hell. He answered yes. And I kid you not, this is his reason. He argued that deep down everyone is born with the knowledge of jesus and the trinity and all of that, even natives in the deepest parts of Africa and South America. But because they decide to reject jesus by not worshiping him, it is right that they all should go to hell.When I saw your comment, I literally rolled my eyes and said to myself "here we go with the everyone is born christian until they reject jesus" bullshit again.

The connection was that he obtained flesh God is spirit, and he now obtained the corruptible flesh of men, so now he could take on the sin eventually on the cross, in his divine state God would not have been able to take sin on because he is a holy God this means that he is pure, without sin, and righteous. My letter envelope metaphor demonstrates Jesus as being pure and righteous as not being directly from the line of Adam, the line that passed on the sin to all mankind rather according to Mat 1:18 Jesus is the child of the Holy Spirit. And if It were never a virgin birth and Joseph was his son he would have been born into sin. Jesus is the lamp of God that washes away the sins of the world through and with his atoning blood. The Hebrew's used to slaughter a lamp in the Old Testament and everyone passed their sins onto the creature and were atoned; atonement from Jesus Christ applies that same principle.Now what makes man a man, sin or his will, his dignity, and his consciousness? I think the latter and Jesus possessed them all, the entire package save for one element and that is sin. But just like the lamp taking on the sins of the Hebrew's in the same way did Jesus double up as this lamp to save from ruin, destruction, and harm whoever believes in him. Here are the two relevant verses. In Gen 2 God is giving the command. In Gen 3 Eve is repeating God.Gen 2:17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.Gen 3:3 but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.First of all she adds the following statement which is not found in God's statement and that is "neither shall ye touch it" secondly she is implying uncertainty to what God said "would happen if you ate it (the fruit) note God said for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Eve replaces the surely die with lest ye die, therefore displaying doubt about a command of God. They had every reason to mistrust the serpent (Satan). He was instructing them to do something that God their maker had informed them not to do. Frankly trusting in a father of lies is a dodgy move, look at what trusting in Satan got them into:
Gen 3:16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy pain and thy conception; in pain thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
Gen 3:17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in toil shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;
Gen 3:18 thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;
Gen 3:19 in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. The state your currently in death (spiritual death leading to hell) sickness sorrow suffering pain anguish this is all due to that one encounter with Satan in the garden."God states specifically that his intent is to keep man from attaining eternal life. Why then would you possibly believe that he bent over backwards trying to provide an easy method for attaining such a thing? If you believe such a story then you must conclude that God is your enemy; it is he and his Cherubim with flaming swords that stand between you and eternal life, not his approval."Why God kept them from eating from the tree of eternal life, is for the reason that human's would have lived forever in a state of sin, and redemption would never have been possible for man. This is very possible. But also note that before the fall in the actual commandment God doesn't mention anything about the tree of life, this lives room for the possibility that we could eat from it and live forever in eternal bliss, note what God said pertaining to tree in general, he said:

"Gen 2:16 And Jehovah God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:"
Gen 2:17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

"As this verses show God had nothing with man eating of the tree of life the only tree he forbade was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And as for the matter of freewill man had always possessed it, that is why he sinned against God, he could also have chosen not to listen to the serpent and not sin against god. This is freewill, the freedom to make choices in accordance with one's will. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is exactly that a tree of knowledge. Note it’s not called the tree of Freewill to choose between good and evil.Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.

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The connection was that he obtained flesh God is spirit, and he now obtained the corruptible flesh of men, so now he could take on the sin eventually on the cross, in his divine state God would not have been able to take sin on because he is a holy God this means that he is pure, without sin, and righteous.

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Since God did not require sacrifices to atone for sin, the death of Jesus doesn't atone for anyone's sins. A mistake or wrong action cannot be undone and can't be "taken on" by another. The person still suffers the consequences of their actions. If they repent they can be forgiven for the mistake or wrong action.Jesus taught and preached repentance not that his death would be an atonement. If you read Leviticus 16, you will see that the actual scapegoat that supposedly "took on" the sins of the people was not sacrificed. It was set loose in the desert.The sacrifices in Leviticus are similar to us paying a parking ticket. It is the penalty for wrong behavior.

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First of all she adds the following statement which is not found in God's statement and that is "neither shall ye touch it" secondly she is implying uncertainty to what God said "would happen if you ate it (the fruit) note God said for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Eve replaces the surely die with lest ye die, therefore displaying doubt about a command of God.

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Eve was talking to a snake, not taking part in a debate or quoting God. The difference is irrelevant. The snake is not Satan. You're adding to the story.The Adam and Eve story is one story that tells how mankind supposedly came to know good and bad, as opposed to the animal kingdom.Right and wrong are concepts that change as mankind changes.Sin still does not exist as a thing that acts on its own.

I think that the notion of sin is just a scam invented to keep people under the boots of priests. In human affairs, the concept of crime is surely sufficient.I suspect that the idea of sin was invented to make sure that people live in a permanant state of anguished guilt and dependant on religion for relief.I have recently spent some time listening to christian radio stations while I commute, from curiosity. My impression is that anyone who took that stuff seriously would be at great risk of serious mental illness.It amazes me that anyone would fall for such an obvious scam.

This was for sure the chief purpose behind the entire Jewish sacrificial system. You have shown not to understand the doctrine of atonement, go on brush up on this and then we can talk again about the role of Jesus in salvation. Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was cast down, the old serpent, he that is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world; he was cast down to the earth, and his angels were cast down with him.

I think that until you know everything there is to know about everything dear Woodsy that you should lay off making such assessments. My favorite and self- coined motto is being open-minded with a sieve. It’s not good to be open-minded about everything neither is good to be close- minded as well, just have a sieve over your mind.I have found that in many cases it is not intellectual hurdles that keep someone from believing in God rather it is more spiritual than that. People just don’t want to give up their sinful ways, because they love being in sin so much, they are enjoying themselves to the fullest and the thought of having to give up all of these pleasures just isn’t thinkable for them. My opening post deals with the problem of sin. Sin is enjoyable but it has a huge downside, and that is death, spiritual death that condemns the doer to hell. Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.

Do you not see how vicious this is? Do you not see that you are the victim of a system that uses your own humanity against you? People like the things that they like for what are (or at least once were) good reasons. What people do is for them to decide in their societies. The idea of sin merely hands power to those who contrive to tell others what things are sinful.If you could present real evidence that your god even exists and that hell or, for that matter, anything spiritual (whatever that means), exists, one could take your ideas seriously. Otherwise, why should one?

You're projecting your mindset onto me, Cedre. Would you care to describe for the forum which sins Coragyps enjoys so freakin' much? Which pleasures of the flesh I just can't give up?You might want to remember that a good number of the atheists on this board are former Christians. But please save us the reply of, "well, you weren't real Christians."

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"The wretched world lies now under the tyranny of foolishness; things are believed by Christians of such absurdity as no one ever could aforetime induce the heathen to believe." - Agobard of Lyons, ca. 830 AD

The text does not include exactly how Eve was informed to avoid the tree so you cannot conclude that she was making a mistake in her recollection of the ban. Also, you need to work on your reading comprehension as "lest ye" does not contain the doubt you think. It is simply pointing out an undesirable consequence to be avoided. First of all, there was no indication that the serpent was Lucifer. Even if it was you keep throwing around the "father of lies" moniker, get it through your head: It was the FIRST time it had done anything wrong! You cannot blame them for not knowing the reputation of something that *has* no reputation.Sure, the snake instructed them to do something they were told not to do, but how can you fairly blame them for that when they are denied the ability to distinguish good from evil? Before they ate the fruit they did not, by design, know that doing so and going against God's will would be evil! Also, stop ragging on the snake: It didn't even lie to them, it is God who lied to Adam and Eve. The fruit did not kill them, it did exactly what the snake said it would do. I know it might be too much to ask for logical arguments, but reading comprehension for a bible-thumper seems pretty important. So how is punishing someone for doing something they didn't even know was wrong fair? Would you leave little "punishment land mines" out for your children, and punish them for arbitrary rules they don't know about?According to your system of belief the very definition of evil is that which goes against God's will, and the definition of good is that which is in accordance with God's will. Adam and Eve violated God's will by eating from the tree... but before they did they were unable to tell the difference between violating God's will and following God's will! God specifically designed them with the inability to obey his commandments, so how is any punishment for that failing fair?

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This was for sure the chief purpose behind the entire Jewish sacrificial system.

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I said God (you know the powerful God) did not require sacrifice to forgive sins. Mankind decided sacrifices were necessary. There's a difference.

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You have shown not to understand the doctrine of atonement, go on brush up on this and then we can talk again about the role of Jesus in salvation.

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We aren't talking about salvation. We are discussing sin and that sin is not a thing that acts on its own. In the course of this the misconception that the sacrificial system atoned for sins was brought up.I understand the doctrine that is usually presented and it is incorrect. There are no sacrifices for intentional sin and as I pointed out earlier the scapegoat that supposedly "took on" the sins of the people was not sacrificed. The scapegoat was set loose in the desert. (Leviticus 16)So people who are struggling against portions of their belief system's moral code or code of behavior, haven't changed their thoughts. IOW, they haven't repented. The way to stop "sinning" is to stop wanting to do what is considered wrong by the belief system or God; depending on which one we consider more important.Mankind has the capacity to do wrong and mankind has the capacity to not do wrong. No big mystery.BTW, Revelations has nothing to do with Genesis. The snake is just a snake.

But that's just it isn't it? You are not being open minded. You will not accept any conclusion that does not support your belief in your god.Your sieve means that you will ignore this post like the others that challenge your a priori assumptions that your god exists.Your are intellectually bankrupt, on this point.Edited by Larni, : The intellectually bankrupt bit.

You closet Emancipatory Marxist, you.