Is there Biblical support for the concept of "Original Sin"?

That's not valid here since the consequences of disobeying God was "death". As my reading of the bible went, there was no death prior to sin. So how can Adam and Eve be held accountable to consequences that are out of their comprehension. They never had seen/heard of/or had explained the concept of death. "They knew the consequences" is not a valid argument given what the bible tells us happened.

quote:

---

pick up a knowledge of obedience and disobedience from the consequences

---

Here's another problem, this implies they get to learn from these mistakes, they don't get that chance they are kicked out ASAP. Also are you going to tell me that individuals that have no ability to know good/evil are competent enough to "pick up" anything? Not to mention what kind of "parent" leaves a individual with the mental capacities of a psycho path (not able to determine right from wrong) alone with something they aren't supposed to touch.The fact is that the game was stacked against Adam from the get go, God allowed him and Eve, two completely incompetent individuals, to be alone with the snake and expects this all to turn out fine because he said not to eat the fruit?... Not only is that just a completely unrealistic expectation, not only is it rigged game (God knew what would happen) that's child neglect where I come from.

because Paul seems to base his assertion on the Genesis 2&3 account and Genesis 2&3 do not support his position. Of course, they did not die that very day, so that consequence is irrelevant.But the big thing is that like Paul, you are simply making unsupported assertions. You claim that they should know to obey a command when they still have no knowledge of right or wrong, of whether they should believe the God character or the serpent.There is simply no support that I can find in the story that says they should know to obey.

---

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

yea it is like you telling your 5 year old:" do not put a nail in the electric soccet" then leaving the room and his older brother comes in and says you know what would be cool if you put that nail in the soccet. Guess what the kid is gonna do? evan if there is no brother the kid will probably try to put the nail in the socet my cousin did it did not kill her though she was shaky for a cupple of years after that now who is to blame the kid or the parrent for not watching her or protecting the soccets from chiildren

He doesn't need to support his position in order for his position to be biblical evidence for the Christian concept of original sin.(perhaps you mean: is there other biblical evidence, besides this from Paul, supporting the Christian concept of original sin?)- I haven't asserted they should know to obey a command. I have asserted that a choice offered, one that is built on promised consequences, requires no knowledge of good and evil on the part of the chooser. Consequences become the motivating/demotivating influences in their choice - not moral considerations.Whether a promised negative consequence is ultimately delivered on isn't relevant to the role that promise plays prior to the choice being made. If they disobey and the promised consequences aren't delivered upon the disobedience still stands.What I am assuming (and I don't see how we can do any differently) is that they understood 'plain English'. Which means "you shall surely die" held some kind of negative connotion for them. A negative consequence attaching to a choice in a certain direction - in other words.Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

No, I mean "Did Paul have any support for his position and assertion or was he simply wrong?" But it still requires a knowledge that they should follow orders from one source as opposed to some later source.That requires as a minimum a requirement that they know one action is right while another action is wrong.God, of course, offered no choices.

---

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

He doesn't need support in order to be right. He'd need to be contradicted in order to be wrong. It seems to me that you have biblical evidence and that you want more. Could you explain why? This person promises these consequences, that person promises those consequences. I can choose based on the lure (positive/negative) of consequences without having any idea of what's right or wrong can't I? Who do you think permitted the serpent to enter the garden?

A few days prior to the garden event, God drops a large stone on Adams toe. Adam yells with pain. God says: "see the stars in the sky. Now imagine what it would be like if that many large stones fell on your toe and you'll begin to understand what death is like".It doesn't matter whether death is like that. What matters is a negative association with the word death is made.We don't know how Adam came by his understanding of any word but if we are to assume he understood something of any of them then we have to assume he had an understanding of them all. Including the word death.A negative association with the word would suffice for the purpose of choice made available.- And? We are assuming they understood language in which case they had an understanding of what consequences meant. Whilst we can't prove the choice was a consequentially balanced one, it does make sense of the rest of the story. An unbalanced choice isn't actually and leads to determinism. Which is a bit of a pointless discussion really.- Adam and Eve could have been smart as hell. More competent to make consequential decisions than you or I perhaps.God left them with a negative consequence. The serpent tempted them with a positive one. They choose. There is no 'supposed not to' element involved ("supposed not" to implies a moral injunction) for folk who weren't yet moral.- See above re: competency.It seems to me that it's you whose stacking the deck. What's written is negative and positive consequence offered. We're not told the power of either consequence being weighed to ensure a 'choice' in a particular direction. It seems fair that we assume a balanced choice for want of evidence to the contraryGod knowing what would happen need not determine what happens. And so the choice remains Adam and Eves alone.Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

And the story in Genesis 2&3 contradicts what he claims. Before children have a concept of right or wrong they tend to simply follow the most recent authority figure. To expect any other behavior would be quite frankly stupid and to punish children for such behavior reprehensible.Neither sin nor death entered the world because of the actions of one man unless, of course, Paul was laying the blame on the God character. And the story tells us nothing about whether or not God allowed the serpent into the garden.But that of course is not relevant to the story. In the story the God character simply says "On the day you do this you will surely die."And of course, that is simply untrue.

---

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

The main question of the OP is the thread title, "Is there Biblical support for the concept of 'Original Sin'?" Romans 5 is part of the Bible. So if Paul teaches the concept in Rom 5, the answer to this question must be "yes", whether we agree with Paul's reasoning or not. Our agreement or disagreement with Paul is irrelevant to the question of what he teaches.

Not at all. One man's unsupported opinion doesn't constitute "Biblical support". What Paul teaches is not necessarily equivalent to what has Biblical support.I'm sure we could find a lot of opinions in the Bible that are just plain wrong. You can't count all of them as Biblically supported just because they're mentioned.

---

"It appears that many of you turn to Hebrew to escape the English...." -- Joseppi

quote:

---

The main question of the OP is the thread title, "Is there Biblical support for the concept of 'Original Sin'?" Romans 5 is part of the Bible. So if Paul teaches the concept in Rom 5, the answer to this question must be "yes", whether we agree with Paul's reasoning or not. Our agreement or disagreement with Paul is irrelevant to the question of what he teaches.

---

But is that what Paul was teaching?The Doctrine of Original Sin is another case of pagan philosophy creeping into Christianity.
The Origin and History of the Doctrine of Original SinWere the authors of the proof texts used to prove the Doctrine of Original Sin actually presenting that belief? To be able to go against God's command, Adam already had a sinful nature, IOW, he was capable of disobedience. Even if we have a sinful nature (evil inclination), it doesn't mean we have no control over our actions. God even told Cain he could control the evil inclinations. Of course we have to remember that sin is an action and not something that exists on it own.
Bible authors like personification.

Does it?Let's remind ourselves of what he claims - our agreed working definition of original sin - and then you can suggest where in Genesis 2 and 3 the contradictory statement lies. Here is Paul again:

quote:

---

For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners
  —Paul

---

- Why pick an analogy involving children? Why not pick the analogy of an adults well capable of making decisions that would result in non-morally related consequences?- If we plump for the 'adult making non-moral consequential choices' analogy? Wouldn't the blame then lie with the choice-maker?- Are we assuming an all powerful, omniscient creator God? If so, then we don't need the story to tell us that God permitted it. It's self-evident that God permitted it given that he knows what the serpent does and doesn't prevent it happening. And so choice would be provided by God.- Let's recall the point being dealt with and recap. You claimed:

quote:

---

Actually, we agree that it is likely that Pal is referring to the Garden of Eve story, however, reading it I find absolutely no support for the position that Adam or Eve were even capable of sinning until after they had eaten the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. They just plain did not have the tools needed to make decisions on right or wrong.

---

Paul talks of their disobedience making all men sinners not their sin. To further counter your claim and elaborate on his, I go on to argue that you don't need to involve morality in order to be disobedient. Once that's established (and I think our adult analogy above indicates how that works) we can see that Adam and Eve can indeed be disobedient before they aquire a knowledge of good and evil.As to your introducing "on the day that you eat"? The issue is disobedience when faced with a choice - not whether the consequences promised as a result of that choice were delivered on or not. Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

And I suppose without disobedience we wouldn't have true free will....

Yes it does. You even quote Paul equating disobedience with sin.But before eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, neither Adam nor Eve had the capability, the tools understand the difference between obey or disobey or that they should obey one authority figure over another.Like children, they simply obeyed the most recent authority figure. Because in the story, they are like children and behave like very young children. An adult would have years of experience dealing with things like consequences, like right and wrong, like should and should not that neither Adam nor Eve had. Of course not, we are assuming the God character in the story who is not all powerful, very bright, omniscient. He too is simply fumbling, learning on the job, prone to fear.

---

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Sorry, but I cannot and will not twist the English language as you desire."Biblical support" for a specific position is generally understood to mean explicit biblical teaching for the position, implicit biblical teaching for the position (e.g. the Trinity), or other biblically-based arguments in support of the position. Any teaching of any biblical author has biblical support, by definition.