Everybody sins.
Hi,
I must agree with this. I think it is wrong to condemn mankind as being inherently bad. It is his adaptablity that brings a lot of problems with it.
I think that what we have is the world in a mess, not because of religion particularly, but due to our inability to stop and think - although ‘inherently’ we could. I read once the wise words that “it isn’t the bad things we do that condemn us, but the good things. For, if we are able to do good once, we can all of the time,” which seems to me to be true.
It is the fact that we can hope, have faith and love others that begs the question, why we don’t more often? It is the fact that we know what would do us good, that asks, why don’t you do unto others as you would have done unto you?
Shalom
Nobody sins, because Sin is Illusion.
How can you sin, if your life was created ???
Whether or not you have free will, was created, sin is an illusion, etc. you still sin.
Kolibri,
You’ve denied every assertion that we are not sinful and maintain that we do indeed sin. Would you please explain your understanding? What is the basis for “everybody sins” ?
JT
We are born pure without sin, but everyone of us sin. Sin is not evil or good. Sinning is a part of being human. Think of the seven deadly sins, do you think that even a single person in the world has not commited one of them or broken one of the ten commandments?
Sinning comes as easy to a human being as breathing.
However, every sin is not an act of evil. It is evil to break some of the ten commandments, but not every commandment is evil to break.
Another somewhat off-topic thought - but in trying to pin down an inherrency-clause for good/evil or any behavioral modifier external to what we dub our I’s, me’s or other assorted pronouns - Are we not in a bit of a lose-lose scenario…?
If it were to be our little slavedriver genes, or God, or whatever other force we denote as external to ourselves - pushing us in one direction or the other…
On the one hand - if we agreed we were predisposed toward evil - it’s a cop-out that’s got everything to do with apportioning the blame for bad behavior away from what we regard as our essential selves, and nothing to do with a taking of responsibility for our actions. “God/Satan told me to do it.” “My genes told me to do it.” The bleating of sociopaths throughout modern history.
And on the other - if we agree we are predisposed toward good - is even worse, in that it pretty much takes the ‘goodness’ out of being ‘good’ in that it becomes an automatic reflex, without conscious choice.
Hello F(r)iends,
Yes, we adapt because we must. How else can we survive? That adaptability is what allows men to view themselves not as monsters but as heros. I wonder how Hitler perceived himself: monster or hero?
Personally, I think that, while it can be a bad thing, the drive to adapt (i.e. the drive to survive) pushes us towards peace. When we have convinced all that our survival depends on co-operation we are one step closer to ensuring our own survival.
-Thirst
Sorry guys, I really can’t go along with this. We are born carrying the sins of our fathers - karma. (or in fact our own sins from the past. I know I know re-incarnation doesn’t work for you lot, but think about it. If we come into the world as sinners, those sins must have come from somewhere…
Sin is to miss the target, the target being your own true divine godly nature.
Dig deeper. To say this is to only skim the surface. Think about your words Kolibri. Are these your own thoughts or do these thoughts belong to your conditioning?
A
We are born innocent.
The way that the act of sinning has been created makes it impossible to not sin. Look at the tenth commandment: ‘You shall not covet your neighbour’s house; you shall not covet your neighbour’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbour’s.’
Basically, one could just as well have said that breathing is a sin.
On the other hand, forgiveness is given just as easily, so it’s not so much of a big deal.
The above is the impression I’ve gotten from my rather limited knowledge of Christian belief.
Personally, I believe that as long as you lead a life of relative goodness then you are home free. Sinning and forgiveness is not that important, because it comes so easily. They cancel eachother out, so to say. In the end you only have your acts of evil or good left.
My dear Essential writes:
But what is the basis for saying that we enter the world as sinners? Other than a faith based belief, I find nothing to suggest original sin…
Of course, the moment we conceptualize good, we create evil, but that is man-derived explanation…
JT
Trust you to take the thing out of context JT. I’m not a Christian man, I don’t believe in sin as is religiously prescribed. But I grasp the concept.
Sin is not about having a predisposition to commit evil. Sin is about moving away from centre. It’s about acting out of desire and unawareness instead of out of heart. Not emotional heart you see, spiritual heart. If one is aware then one cannot sin. I believe this is where your question of morality enters. Morality comes out of awareness.
When we are born, we have the body of a baby that needs nurturing to grow, there is a part of that baby that is eternal. It’s the eternal part that carries the karma. So yes, babies are innocent and here in lies the paradox.
Go ahead JT, ask another question, let’s dance!
A
Sweet Dangle:
Gee, I must have misunderstood. 
So you are agreeing that man is inherently good, and you imply that “sin” is something learned, and that to be “sinless” one must un-learn their sinful ways. Did I get it right this time? 
You say that desire and unawareness are the roots of sin. That covers a lot of territory. Ummm, the desire part: how would I know when a desire has become sinful? I desire the best for everyone, including myself, is this sinful? Is it possible to desire that which is good, but in my unawareness, commit a sin(s)? The unawareness thing: There are things of which I am aware. I’m also aware of being unaware (of some things). It seems to me that being unaware is an endlessly receding horizon. I am unaware of being unaware of being unaware of being… Please explain how you know that there isn’t another unaware just behind your last aware?
One get’s the feeling that there is no way to know what is and what isn’t sin, and there is no way to know what one is unaware of.
You have me suspended in mid-air. Help!!!
JT
Hi,
Leaning heavily on Neil Douglas-Klotz’ transliteration of Mt. 12:31 out of the Aramaic, sin isn’t something that has to be permanent, but something that is essentially repairable. I don’t see it as something inherent, but still very much part of our personality.
According to the Gospel, all types of twisted behaviour, the gone astray and missing the mark, the rips and the tears – all the ways we cut ourselves off, break our connections, or disrupt the pattern – can and will be put back together. Sooner or later, we will be freed from error, our mistakes omitted, our arrhythmic state returned to the original heartbeat of life.
But our state cannot be put right or repaired, when we cut ourselves off from the source of all spirituality – the breathing in, the breathing out of the Holy Breath. This is the “sin against the Holy Spirit†that can’t be repaired.
Shalom
I offer you a waltz tentative and you give me a carrot? I think Bob has saved the day as only Bob knows how. As usual Bob you’ve showed us all up! Kinda saves me from throwing the reincarnation stuff in innit!
We are not inherently good JT, we are inherently Divine.
A
Hi Lady A
You put a lot into that post.
The description of the fall of Adam and Eve describes the initial movement away from the center and how the outer man would begin to dominate the inner man subjecting Adam and Eve to work the earth from which their bodies were taken and losing the Garden of Eden where the soul of man resides
We could have an entire discussion on that. I remember when I first read that man does not do anything for the sake of evil but only for good as he understands it. Naturally the whole Hitler argument passed through my head and it took a while for my thick skull to finally understand the depth of the remark since this whole idea wasn’t about what one does since we really don’t do anything. Instead sin only came into existence when a person begins to feel human purpose and strives internally in that direction. Sin becomes relative to the goal of return to the center. Original sin though is a state of being gradually acquired through heredity of what was passed along after the fall and maintains itself through what all the ancient traditions call “sleep”.
Now you’re writing like an esoteric Christian. 
For me it is a wonderful observation. When the spiritual heart appears it replaces the negative reactive emotional level of the heart. Stoicism recognizes Apatheia as subduing useless negative emotion in ourselves in the pursuit of reason. But from the esoteric Christian perspective, Apatheia invites this higher energy of feelings into our spiritual heart to fill the void left by our lack of emotional reaction and reveals human direction and a goal beyond reason. I like the way Simone Weil puts this:
It is these feelings initiating from love that reveal human direction towards the center for those open to it.
As I understand it, morality is an interpreted result of influences associated with objective conscience which is different than the programmed state of values that influence our subjective lives which we call conscience. So objective conscience related to consciousness is a much higher emotional level of awareness than programmed morality which, as you know from everything that happens in the world, can change at a moments notice.
Quite true. We are a plurality and not just the shell. Our task is to allow the inner to feed off of the outer instead our outer habitual life through its egotism denying the impressions of reality necessary for the growth of the inner man. In this way our spirit and body live and work in harmony as a common whole. Our bodies are just innocent machines that fall victim to our negative emotional states but together they serve to keep man tied to the earth through “attachment”, an idea common to all the ancient traditions.
No, its not easy.
Dearest Angel,
Any chance we could waltz and eat carrots at the same time? 
Apart from the foo foo, my questions were serious.
How would one know sin apart from a man-made definition?
How does one decide that they are truly aware as opposed to just another layer of awareness followed by a deeper layer of unawareness? At what point does one arrive at total awareness and how would one know that?
May I have this dance?
JT
You are complicating things. Why question your awareness? If you were out in the wild, with no protection, and there were wild beasts around you at night, you would be aware soon enough.
Maybe ask some of the guys who fought in the 2nd world war. With bullets flying past you, your life on the line every second, you would be aware alright.
It is when you are pushed, you find your awareness. As for knowing sin, well what is so bad about sin being defined by man? Perhaps the creator intended for man, who has free will after all, to decide which things he would see as sinful. Part of the plan. Because sin is defined by man does,nt mean that it cannot be divine at the same time.
What do you mean by the breathing in and out of holy spirit?
When one has the holy spirit it lives within them and they “Breathe” the holy spirit, but upon rejecting the holy spirit they commit sin against the holy spirit.