Adam's condition and our destiny
Mark's original question follows;
I am always looking for the big picture in theology and I have a proposal. The thing is, it is complicated and difficult to get out in one breath. So I want to present a part, just two things. First of all, in what condition was Adam originally created, and how does our destiny in Christ relate to Adam’s original destiny that he did not reach because of sin.
In tradition theology, especially in the Catholic tradition, the fall of man is called a ‘felix culpa,’ that is, a fortunate fault. The idea is that whatever Adam could have had or become is nothing compared to what we will be in Christ. The grace of Christ has not simply returned us to the goodness of Eden, but has taken us much further. And therefore, yes, the fall in Genesis 3 was bad, but it was fortunate because it enabled God to be more gracious than would have been the case.
Well, I don’t like the felix culpa idea. And yet I do want to say that what we have in Christ is more than what Adam had. And yet I don’t want to completely differentiate Adam’s original destiny and our destiny in Christ. So here is what I propose. It is not new. Irenaeus had similar ideas, as well as much of pre-Nicene Christianity. Others have thought and said it too, but I think it makes good practical sense for today.
Adam and Eve, being in the image and likeness of God, were put in charge of all creation. However, their original condition was not perfect righteousness, holiness and knowledge. They were immature and young. God expected them to grow into the calling he had for them. God called them to rule over the whole earth, but he put them into a garden that God planted. The garden did not cover the whole earth, just a small part. Rather Adam was to begin the work in the garden of Eden, and by personal growth and by being fuitful and multiplying, he and his progeny were to extend the boundaries of the garden until they covered the whole earth.
Now sin ruined the situation, and we are all in a much worse spot than Adam originally was. But our destiny is the same. Our destiny in Christ is the same as Adam’s original destiny. But because we are all in sin, God had to do a great work of grace to bring us from the much further distance. So the fall was not fortuitous. It was an evil setback. But God’s grace is able to restore us. Now in Christ we do not return to Adam’s original state of immature innocence, but we are to grow by grace toward the same destiny that Adam was reaching for.
Now this prompts me to ask about the mechanics of personal growth in holiness and virtue. Is it possible to grow in holiness and wisdom without being or having been in sin? In other words, is it necessary, before one can be humble, to have once been proud? Or is it necessary for one to have been disobedient before one can learn to be obedient? My point is that Adam was not mature in virtue and holiness, but was expected to grow in them. And growth is possible without being in or having been in sin.
Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature (Luke 2:52), and he learned obedience by the things he suffered (Hebrews 5:8). But that does not mean he was foolish and disobedient before the grew in wisdom or learned obedience. With Adam it was the same. Immaturity is a in for those who should be further along than they are, such as the Hebrews who should already be teaching (Hebrews 5:11-12) or the Corinthians who should have been more spiritual.
So, our destiny and Adam’s destiny was to live in the image of God on earth, in fellowship with him and with each other on the New earth (Revelation 21-22). This has other implications and connections, but the starting point is important for any telling of a story, and so I want to get it right. I have Biblical and theological and historical documentation for a lot of this, but I didn’t want to get to complicated. Thanks for any feedback.
I am always looking for the big picture in theology and I have a proposal. The thing is, it is complicated and difficult to get out in one breath. So I want to present a part, just two things. First of all, in what condition was Adam originally created, and how does our destiny in Christ relate to Adam’s original destiny that he did not reach because of sin.
In tradition theology, especially in the Catholic tradition, the fall of man is called a ‘felix culpa,’ that is, a fortunate fault. The idea is that whatever Adam could have had or become is nothing compared to what we will be in Christ. The grace of Christ has not simply returned us to the goodness of Eden, but has taken us much further. And therefore, yes, the fall in Genesis 3 was bad, but it was fortunate because it enabled God to be more gracious than would have been the case.
Well, I don’t like the felix culpa idea. And yet I do want to say that what we have in Christ is more than what Adam had. And yet I don’t want to completely differentiate Adam’s original destiny and our destiny in Christ. So here is what I propose. It is not new. Irenaeus had similar ideas, as well as much of pre-Nicene Christianity. Others have thought and said it too, but I think it makes good practical sense for today.
Adam and Eve, being in the image and likeness of God, were put in charge of all creation. However, their original condition was not perfect righteousness, holiness and knowledge. They were immature and young. God expected them to grow into the calling he had for them. God called them to rule over the whole earth, but he put them into a garden that God planted. The garden did not cover the whole earth, just a small part. Rather Adam was to begin the work in the garden of Eden, and by personal growth and by being fuitful and multiplying, he and his progeny were to extend the boundaries of the garden until they covered the whole earth.
Now sin ruined the situation, and we are all in a much worse spot than Adam originally was. But our destiny is the same. Our destiny in Christ is the same as Adam’s original destiny. But because we are all in sin, God had to do a great work of grace to bring us from the much further distance. So the fall was not fortuitous. It was an evil setback. But God’s grace is able to restore us. Now in Christ we do not return to Adam’s original state of immature innocence, but we are to grow by grace toward the same destiny that Adam was reaching for.
Now this prompts me to ask about the mechanics of personal growth in holiness and virtue. Is it possible to grow in holiness and wisdom without being or having been in sin? In other words, is it necessary, before one can be humble, to have once been proud? Or is it necessary for one to have been disobedient before one can learn to be obedient? My point is that Adam was not mature in virtue and holiness, but was expected to grow in them. And growth is possible without being in or having been in sin.
Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature (Luke 2:52), and he learned obedience by the things he suffered (Hebrews 5:8). But that does not mean he was foolish and disobedient before the grew in wisdom or learned obedience. With Adam it was the same. Immaturity is a in for those who should be further along than they are, such as the Hebrews who should already be teaching (Hebrews 5:11-12) or the Corinthians who should have been more spiritual.
So, our destiny and Adam’s destiny was to live in the image of God on earth, in fellowship with him and with each other on the New earth (Revelation 21-22). This has other implications and connections, but the starting point is important for any telling of a story, and so I want to get it right. I have Biblical and theological and historical documentation for a lot of this, but I didn’t want to get to complicated. Thanks for any feedback.
posted by P. Beard at 12:22 PM
4 Comments:
I think it (our situation) may be better in that God's glory has been displayed in an awesome way (according to His plan) and now His Church displays His manifold wisdom even to Heaven. It is better in the same way that a full grown man is "better than" a baby (while his "innocence" has been lost and his knowledge of evil has increased his knowledge of good has increased).
Keep in mind that the Lamb was slain before the foundations of the world, yet it was through the revelation of the Gospel of the Christ that this reality was incarnated. The fall and knowledge of sin had to occur for the Mystery of Christ to be revealed.
Other than Christ, I don't know of anyone who has ever learned obedience, humilty or any other godly character without first having been the opposite. So, in many ways that part of the question may be irrelevant. Unlike Christ we are born sinners and are dead in our sins, we must be reborn and made a new creation.
I wanted to add some documentation to my post. I wasn’t sure if I should make it another post or put it into the comments. Patrick, feel free to do what you wish on that.
Regarding the garden of Eden and the condition of the earth, Adam is told to fill, rule over and subdue the earth. Yet God plants a garden in Eden and puts the man there. When God curses man, he does not curse the garden where Adam was put, but requires Adam and Eve to leave the garden. Genesis 3:17 -18 does not require us to say that before this point there were no thorns, but rather that now thorns and weeds would be a greater part of man’s experience than they were in the garden. Gordon Wenham in his commentary on Genesis brings out the distinctions in the definitions for the words used for plants in Genesis 2-3.
Genesis 2:19 is an important verse for me. It says that God brought the animals to Adam to see what Adam would name them. This implies several things. First, naming is a way of subduing, it is a way of learning and understanding. God did not bring the animals to Adam so that God could tell Adam their names. God wanted “to see what he would name them.” Adam was an actual working choosing being. God wanted Adam to exert and do and work. God put Adam in the garden to work it. This was a beginning of that work.
Adam and Eve were created naked, but they were not ashamed. After they sinned, it says they “realized they were naked” (Genesis 3:7). I think they knew they were naked before; it would be ridiculous to think they didn’t know they were naked. So what changed? After sin they had a different view of their nudity. Before they sinned they had not only a view of their nudity without sin, it was also an immature, child-like view of their state.
In Genesis 3:22, God say that Adam and Eve then had the same knowledge that God had. How could such knowledge be okay for God but harmful for Adam and Eve? Adam and Eve’s sin in taking from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was that they were trying to get a level of knowledge that was inappropriate and wrong for their maturity level. In different parts of the Bible the idea of the knowledge of good and evil is associated with maturity (Isaiah 7:15; Hebrews 5:14). We explain more things to our kids as they grow and are able to handle and process the knowledge we give them. But Adam and Eve reached beyond them, aspiring to be like God. This was hubris, not accepting their finiteness.
The view of Adam and Eve as immature was often found in Ante-nicene theology. J. N. D. Kelly documents this in his “Early Christian Doctrines”. On pages 168 and 171 he says that Tatian, Theophilus and Irenaeus all held to this idea.
Another important idea is about Adam’s body: was it immortal or mortal at creation? An important passage for me here is I Corinthians 15:45-49. Adam’s body was mortal, and could eventually have become like Christ’s resurrection body. Adam needed (by grace even then) to grow in his relationship with God and in holiness and love, and would have developed into Christ-likeness. Adam was created with acceptance before God and with some knowledge. But he was immature overall and physically mortal. He needed to grow and develop.
I agree for the most part with Augustine’s exposition of these verses in his “City of God” bk. 13 chap. 23. Well, here is another installment. I hope it is not too much of a burden and will actually bring some clarification. Thanks for any input.
In response to nazianzus:
Nazianzus said:
"I don't really understand the comment that what we have in Christ is better than what Adam had."
My answer: That statement was a part of my description of an overall view I was rejecting. I am not sure we can simply compare our present state with Adam. I think there are many ways in which Adam's condition is much better than out present one, which explains why both in the Bible and in history people have looked back longlingly to the wonderful paradise of the garden of Eden.
My point was that the destiny that Adam could have reached had he not sinned is the same as the one God is bringing us to by salvation in Christ. God is restoring us, not to what Adam was, but to what Adam had been destined to become, and that is to be like Christ, the true image of God (Colossians 1:15; 3:10).
As to Adam and Eve "losing their salvation", they would of course had to have been saved, which would then mean that at one time they would need to have been lost. But they had never been lost. They fell from a good relationship with God to one of alienation, but they cannot be said to have lost something they never had.
Patrick said:
"Other than Christ, I don't know of anyone who has ever learned obedience, humilty or any other godly character without first having been the opposite. So, in many ways that part of the question may be irrelevant."
The relevance comes in that we can understand that learning and growing are an essential part of what it means to be human, rather than it being simply an aspect of life as a sinner. Certainly we grow onw from a position of sin, but in the garden and in the future, life will not be static. Growing is a part of what it means to be alive, and so the insight helps us to better understand the salvation we will enjoy for all eternity.
Post a Comment
<< Home