Reiyen wrote:
I wouldn't say that this system is Pelagian.
Treading dangerously close, not entirely abandoned over the line yet, is my estimation.
Reiyen wrote:
Pelagianism denies original sin, saying that mankind since Adam is not intrinsically sinful.
Yes, that's true, but it's not that simple. (I'm not all that well-versed in Church history, just a dabbler who took a survey course in it for my first Religion elective in college, but we spent a week of that course on the period of the Pelagian controversy.) The distinguishing feature of Pelagianism I'm worried about here is that it puts evil, temptation, and such things as forces entirely external to the "real person", who can choose to sin, choose to not sin, choose to reject Jesus, or choose to believe in Jesus.
Reiyen wrote:
I just assign the intrinsic sinful nature to one specific part of the individual which is not their physical body.
... and not the "essential person" either, based on your description of "spirit".
Reiyen wrote:
I have designed this so as to magnify the importance of individual choice, which is in tandem with the Pelagian heresy, but, as you said, does not assume the same foundation. I do deliberately increase the importance of moral choices, but I don't think theology is jeopardized.
I assume that by "moral choices" you don't mean the opposite of "immoral hoices", but rather choices involving morality, in which one can choose to do good or evil. The thing is, the Bible makes it clear that we, "dead in our trespasses and sins", cannot of ourselves make a moral choice---or, rather, when we come to a moral choice, we cannot choose the moral path. Our inherited sin nature has tainted every part of us, including our bodies (with the rest of creation), our spirits ("dead"), our reason, and our moral capacity. I think Augustine said that Adam could sin, in Adam we cannot not sin, in Christ we can not sin, and that in the end we'll be in a state where we cannot sin. In our salvation, we bring nothing of any value to the table. God brings us, God provides the faith through which we are saved, and God does the saving. All is grace. Only after we have been saved---and have begun to be regenerated into true life---can we choose to obey God and do what is right (and even then it's not really us, but Christ in us, that chooses to obey). Pelagians refuse to acept this, and claim that as God freely chooses to offer salvation, so man can freely choose to accept it.
With this system you've developed, either you've made a sin nature be by definition an essential part of a spiritually-alive being---which seems ... backwards---or you've made the "flesh" (in Paul's term, not yours) be something that a being has, merely a sort of personal tempter, rather than a harmful twist that runs through his entire being.
I hope this clarifies my concern somewhat?
