I've been thinking more deeply about the different races in Vadra, and I've been doing my best to focus on the humans and get some development done there before moving on to the fantastically fun stuff.
I've decided that the humans are the first to sin, and was thinking about what that would mean for the rest of Vadra, and even the universe (multiverse?) it lives in...should the other races be affected by sin before they've committed any, or should just the land the humans inhabit be affected by it?
Thinking more about it, I think it'd make sense for the "whole of creation" to be negatively affected by sin as soon as humans "start it" (I think this would be a good example of how our sin can, and does, affect those around us). Even so, they wouldn't yet be born with sin nature, until someone from each race would give in to temptation and sin, then the offspring of those that sinned would be more prone to it. So the entire race would not have a sin nature until everyone from the race had either been born of a sinner, or sinned themselves...

Does this sound theologically correct for another world that has different things going on in it than we do? Does it seem to line up with how things would work if God created a world with multiple sentient races?
Thoughts please.

The effects (BTW, you mean "affected", not "effected") of sin on creation---the curse on the ground, what Paul describes as it "groaning"---are an instance of divine judgment and mercy (after cursing the serpent, God curses the ground instead of us), so in an otherworld you have quite a bit of leeway to handle it differently.

The main problem I see from your description is that you have entire races becoming "fallen" or "bent" when one member first sins. In our own history, we have a sin nature---we are "bent"---because we were "in Adam" when he sinned. If our first parents had borne a child before the Fall, then unless (as I've heard somewhat persuasively argued) the incident with the serpent and the fruit in the Garden merely exposed a tendency toward sin rather than creating it, the child would not have had such a tendency and would not have been "sinful by nature."

In my own work, I avoid this question entirely, and write about races that are already centuries or millennia old even if the worlds they're now inhabiting are quite young.

Thanks for the reply!



Ok, that makes sense.



Oops, I know what you mean...I forgot about that small detail when I wrote the post...but I do mean that it would be the offspring of those that sinned that would be affected (by being born with sin nature) while others would be able to stand against it.

Cool, thanks for those thoughts and that reminder (and telling me I used the wrong -ffect word...I always get those mixed up).

(Returning to the "effects"/"affects" confusion tangent one last time; you got them backward again in your reply.)

One way I remember the proper usage of "effect" and "affect" as verbs (other than that nearly every time you just mean "affect"; "effect" in its proper use is vanishingly rare) is that one "effects" a change (i.e. puts it into effect), but "affects" someone or something with a change. The direct object of "effect" is the change or effect itself; the direct object of "affect" is the person or thing affected by the change or effect.

(End tangent, I hope.)

Okay, thanks! Your advice will have a good affect on my writing. (how was that?)

Back on topic, I was just thinking yesterday about how complicated it'll be keeping track of all the sinful, semi-sinful, and unfallen races...and it will be extremely hard to figure out how an unfallen race would behave...would they do some things wrong unknowingly (like Adam and Eve did by being naked)? Because it seems to me that the main thing helping Adam and Eve keep from sinning was direct knowledge of it (other than the obvious conclusion that disobeying God would be wrong).
Or would my unfallen races (and portions of races) know about things that are sins (somewhat, but not knowing much about it since they don't commit it), and simply avoid them?...I suppose no one could know exactly, but if you have any thoughts I'd like to hear (or, read, I mean) them!

People often get confused on this point. The key thing to remember is this: why does the whole world groan for Adam's mistake, and why do Adam's descendants suffer for a choice they didn't make?

It's because Adam was the master of the entire universe. In creation, which was and is man's dominion, Adam was second only to God. So he when he chose, he chose for all things under his dominion.

The creation did not fall when Eve sinned. Only she because sinful. We can therefore conclude that if anyone other than Adam has sinned before him, it would have effected that individual only. So, the fallen nature of the universe is due to Adam's decision.

So, if the other races in your world are under the dominion of man, they should fall as well. But if they have their own dominions, they and everything under their power would be spared.

I think that answers your basic questions, so I'd like to address some specific things that have come up.





Thus, we see that "groaning" refers not the curse on the ground but to a direct, inescapable result of Adam's sin. When the "Adam", the "dominus" (if you will) of creation sins, the "groaning" is an inescapable consequence.



You are correct, that if a single member of race were to sin while other members of the race existed, it would effect only that member. This is clearly the case of Eve, who's sin doesn't effect Adam or the creation.

But Adam is an exception because of his position. Adam is the dominus. All creation is under his dominion, his rulership. His spiritual condition is the spiritual condition of the universe. So, his child, and his later children, would be effect, just as creation would.

And eating the fruit in the Garden did not create sin or evil. Sin and evil are not things which can be created. Sin and evil have no substance: they exist in actions, and actions are judged as the right choice or the absence of the right choice. Just as darkness is defined by light, sinful behavior is defined by the absence of right behavior.



Adam and Eve committed no sin before the fall, knowingly or unknowingly. This can be demonstrated by two arguments, the first being simply that people are held fully accountable for unknowing sin and Adam and Eve would have been judged likewise.

Secondly, it was not sinful for Adam and Eve to be unclothed. The fact that they were without shame is not to say that they were "shameless" in the sense of not knowing evil but that in their perfection they were free of shame.

Why was it not sinful for Adam and Eve to be unclothed? Well, I've written more extensively on this, but this topic is not the place for that topic. So, to put it briefly:

Adam and Eve's relationship (the relationship of husband and wife) is a parallelism for our relationship to Christ as His Bride. Before the fall, our spirits were intimately exposed and open to God's. Adam and Eve's bodies were intimately and openly exposed to each other. Parallelism. After the fall, our relationship with God was veiled, and our spirits, being utterly sinful, were covered over by the Law, which ended our intimacy with God. This caused a similar effect in the physical world, causing Adam and Eve to need to cover over the bodies and veil their intimacy due to their sin natures. There is an exact parallelism. It is both reality and metaphor. This is ultimately confirmed by God's sacrificing of the lamb (the first sacrifice) to make skins to cover Adam and Eve, this event doubling as the first blood sacrifice to satisfy the Law, which indicates the connection.

So Adam and Eve were not in sin by being naked and unashamed. And, recall that any sin would have caused Adam and Eve to fall. But there was only one sin capable of even attracting their attention, let alone leading them astray.

Finally, I'd like to mention a bit of the theology behind the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Eating of the Tree gave Adam knowledge of what was evil, yes. But it was not that knowledge which made Adam sinful. It was the fact that he disobeyed God.

And why would God place the Tree in the Garden? Why knowingly tempt his servants? Well, it wasn't temptation.

In their unfallen and incredibly naive state, they loved God merely because they couldn't help it. Nobody could help it. But God wanted them to learn true love, love that is based on faith, and trust. A true relationship.

By choosing not to eat of the Tree after being confronted by the Serpent, Adam and Eve would have been trusting God. They didn't know what the nature of the Tree was, nor why God had forbidden them from eating of it. Therefore, by acting in obedience to Him in the face of direct opposition, they would have demonstrated trust and faith. This would have taken their relationship with Him to a new level. They would have been beyond temptation for ever, just as we will be in Heaven.

But they sinned, and trusted the Serpent instead. By trusting him, they placed themselves in his power, and gave their dominion over to him. And that is how the prince of the power of the air came to rule the Earth.

It is not for nothing that Christ is called the Last Adam. The First Adam was our master and lead us to sin. But we can exchange him for a new Master, the Last Adam, who will lead us out of Sin. Both Adams hold dominion over man. But only one Adam keeps that dominion, the Last Adam.

Sorry, I didn't mean to preach at you guys. I hope this has been helpful.

Well, I'm not sure if there's anything that actually specifies that it was Adam's sin and only Adam's sin that affected all of creation. I think God placed both Adam and Eve over creation, so if just Adam had fallen, and not Eve, the effect might have been different, and if only Eve had sinned, I think it would still have affected creation, just not as much. Unless the Bible actually says something specific about that, though, we can't really be sure. Also, I think if someone else had sinned first, while it might not have affected creation at all, and certainly not as much, I suspect it would still have affected that person's descendants. If Adam and Eve had sinned after having a child, and that child didn't, I'm not sure that child would feel the full effects of the Fall, though. Adam's sons were referred to being born 'in his image and likeness', and at that point, I think the sin nature was a part of it, and that that is why it was passed on.

Thanks both of you! Don't worry Neil, your post was mind-blowingly helpful! I wasn't thinking that clearly when I suggested that Adam and Eve might have unknowingly done something wrong... Thanks again all of you guys.

I would like to point something out here, and this may help with your world, Wolf. Someone did sin before man. Lucifer and his followers. But only they were affected (is that the proper use? ) by it. I suppose you could say Adam and Eve were indirectly affected by it because Lucifer tempted them, but they could have resisted and not suffered from sin, even though Lucifer had sinned. I think this may be because Lucifer wasn't really in control of anything.

So, I think that it is possible to have un-fallen races and fallen races, as at one point in time it seems our world had that. But I don't think there is any middle ground. I know some have mentioned that if Adam and Eve had a child before they fell, the child might not have suffered sin as much, but I'm not sure that would have been the case. The child would have been under Adam and Eve's dominion, so the child would have also suffered along with the rest of the world.

Hope that helped!

Good point, thanks! Yeah, and I suppose you could also say there's a race that is partly unfallen and partly fallen since that's what angels seem to be...of course I don't know much about this, but it seems like if an angel rebels, that's the end of it for them, they're cast out...but God hasn't really said much about angels as far as I know, so...
Anyway, good thoughts! I have thought, too, that if Adam and Eve had sinned right after having kids, they would have illy influenced them, and their kids would sin too, and that'd be the end of unfallen-ness in our race. But, it makes sense that if they had a bunch of kids, who eventually moved away and didn't live near them so much anymore, then sinned for the first time, it may've been different.
Thanks for your post, it has given me more food for thought.

No, that's not right ... but it's not confusing two verbs. There is no noun "affect".


"semi-sinful" is a worrying phrase. Either a race is sinful---"bent"---or it's not, surely?

I don't think that they did do wrong; after they "knew evil" by eating the fruit, their consciences convicted them of being naked, but before that the only thing wrong that they could do was to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

There are some things that are always sinful for anyone to do, and there are some (possibly only a very few and only very general) thing that are never sinful to do, but many things depend in some way on the context---the Israelite dietary laws were binding on the Israelites and (perhaps) on any foreigners who lived in their towns, but not on the rest of the world; eating meat was sinful before the Flood but not afterward; doing work is usually sinful on the Sabbath, but not always and arguably not for those outside God's covenant; and eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols is sinful for those whose conscience tells them it's sinful but not for some others. To give only a few examples.



That's not at all the understanding I get from the explanations later in Scripture. Adam's descendants "suffer" for "a choice they didn't make" because they were "in Adam" when it was made; they participated in it.

And Paul says that "the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God." I include the otherwise-not-relevant-here purpose clause ("in hope that ...") because this makes it clear that the one "who subjected it" is not Adam, as a side effect of his sin, but God. God chose to banish our first parents and curse the ground rather than Adam directly "in hope."



I see no such thing; in fact I see precisely the opposite. And in the letter to the Romans, Pau's already discussed the inescapable (but for the grace of God) consequence of sin: "the wages of sin is death."



("Affect", not "effect".)



"Post hoc, ergo propter hoc." Just because the condition of the physical universe mirrors our spiritual condition, doesn't mean that the universe is falling apart physically because and only because human beings are spiritually "bent"; instead, the Genesis account and the Romans passage tell us, it's because God caused it to become "futile". (In the Genesis account, God first punishes the serpent for leading Adam and Eve astray by laying a curse on it, then punishes Eve---for causing her husband to sin, by my interpretation---with what we may reasonably call a curse but the text itself does not, and then ... instead of punishing---cursing---Adam, curses "the ground", which we gather from what we see today included all of creation. This, and God's covering of them with animal skins, are the first example of substitution in the Bible.)



Mmm ... maybe.


Excellent point, Captain! (And yes, that's the right word.)


I think the hypothetical child would have suffered the effects on the creation just as much, but I do not believe (though I am not at all sure on this point) that such a child would have been "sinful by nature."

Figures. Yeah that is a worrying phrase, except I don't mean on a level of the individuals, like if a race split into two tribes and one tribe became sinners while the other tribe remained unfallen, that race would be a semi-sinful or semi-fallen race.That makes sense.

Good discussion here, this is all very interesting.

Fair enough. In my own lexicon I would make each "tribe" in that case become its own "race", but that's a matter of semantics rather than a substantive issue.

Oh yes, I see what you mean. You meant the "people group" version of the word "race" Yeah I use the word Race for different families of creatures (Centaurs, Humans, Dwarves,) in case anyone else is confused.

Nothing so specific, really. We have "kind" as the most general category (if elves, dwarves, humans, etc., can intermarry, they're the same "kind"), then "race" for a group all of whose members are (is "ontologically" the word I'm looking for here?) connected---as all human beings are because we are/were all "in Adam." Then there's "nation", "tribe", "people", and so on. But I'm usually rather vague on these distinctions.

Kingjon: Just to be clear, for the record, I hope I do not come across as argumentative. As someone who has trained and competed in formal debate, I understand that gracefulness and genuine politeness are essential to arriving at the truth.

That said, it is the truth I am interested in, and having said what I think on this subject, I would be essentially retracting my statements if I did not defend them.

You've invoked the "post-hoc-propter-hoc" fallacy. Therefore, I will invoke several other laws of formal debate.

Firstly, its clear that you've taken the part of the negative, or refuting party, to my arguments, while I am clearly in the role of the affirming party. Therefore, I remind you that I have the burden of proof, which requires that I reasonably defend my statements rather than making claims without basis. You, however, have the burden of refutation, which requires that present reasonably supported statements against mine. Un-supported statements do not fulfill the burden of refutation.




Exactly, many things depend on the context. In their sinless context, Adam and Eve were not sinning to be naked. In their fallen context, it had become sinful.



I'm not sure what connection you're establishing between the banishment and the subjecting of sin. Nor is the curse of the ground related to the fact that animals, insects, and even the far reaches of the universe are now subjected to sin. The whole creation "groans", not just the dirt and the weeds.

Note the grammar of the passage: "because of him who subjected it". In other words, somebody other than the one who subjected it allowed the subjection because of the one who subjected it and because of hope. God allowed it. Adam caused it.

If you agree that Adam would be held guilty for subjecting something to evil, then surely God would be guilty if he subjected anything to evil. Therefore, God did not subject the creation to evil.



Is not death part of the "groaning" of creation? Suffering, death, deceit, violation, corruption, corrosion, and destruction? How is death not a part of the groaning?

And, you've still offered no contention demonstrating that the groaning refers to, and only to, the curse on the ground.



You'll have to pardon me, spelling and usage were never my "forte", nor is it easy to focus on both the nuances of written English and the nuances of my arguments.



I am not arguing "propter-hoc". This contention is clearly supported by several logical links: a) Adam, not God, subjected creation to futility, which was his prerogative as the master of his dominion, b) surely cursing the "ground" does not explain why the entire universe (including stars, the seas, even the very fabric of our cosmos) is groaning. All creation, everything He created suffers. Not just the ground.

Besides that, the grammar of God's curse on the ground does not assume that the ground was not already infected with sin. It merely assumes that Adam would still be able to receive nourishment from the ground at little to no expense on his part. God therefore curses Adam that the ground will resist him and that weeds and thorns will choke his crops. God doesn't curse plants that already exist: he raises up thorns against Adam.

Finally, observe that plants already lived and died before Adam sinned. Obviously Adam had to eat, and besides that he did eat, plants. The reason he could do so was that plants do not count as "life" (possessing no blood) and therefor cannot die (death being the indicator of sin).

If you're curious as to the relationship between blood and life, note that the shedding of blood (which can constitute a symbolic or actual death) is the atonement for sin, death being the penalty which the shedding of blood satisfies. But this is beyond the scope of our discussion.

The point is that raising up thorns hardly constitutes subjecting the entire universe to evil.



Not maybe, certainly. The concept that evil constitutes a substance or force is by definition opposed to Christianity. Likewise, the idea that sin exists in some fashion other than the nature of an action would undermine the Christian concepts of sin and righteousness, and therefore atonement, and ultimately all theology.



Again, you present on contention supporting your statement. I believe that child would have participated in Adam's sin just as much as you or I have: fully and willingly, despite our not being present.

Finally, you have no explanation for why Adam was held fully accountable for all the consequences of sin, but Eve was held accountable merely for her tempting of Adam and therefore complicity with his sin. This is explained only by the assumption that Adam was the master of the whole universe. Besides that, God explicitly gives the creation to Adam prior to the fall.

I hope you understand that I am not arguing with you, nor personally attacking you. It is just important to me that we try to get at the truth here, and only a conversation in which opposing viewpoints and presented and thoroughly discussed achieves that goal.

Nod. Though after a while it wouldnt neccessarily be at all unreasonable to say "I've said all I can say here, and the conversation isn't going anywhere," and just let go.

My own "debate" background (though any discussion of this should go to PM or a new thread in General Discussion) is in "cross-ex" or "policy" debate---our school hasn't had a team since the current debate teacher was herself a student, but we had competition in class (my favorite class!) and once went on a field trip to watch the state finals---with a wee bit of more general background in logic, philosophy, etc., from my parents (one of my dad's undergrad majors was in philosophy, and that was his field in grad school) and from general reading.


Mmm ... I'd say that each of us has presented an interpretation that he believes to be the correct one, and the two contradict each other fairly directly.



I'm saying that instead of cursing Adam as punishment for his disobedience, God chose to a) curse "the ground" (more on that in a moment), and b) banish our first parents from the garden. The same story explains both why we're no longer in paradise and why the universe is falling apart.



I recognize that it'd be hard to prove a negative , but (as I said) I understand the statement "cursed is the ground" to clearly refer to the creation as a whole, so I'd need to see more than just this assertion to be convinced that it just refers to "dirt." And I object to your statement "subjected to sin": subjected to the effects of sin, yes, but the language describes futility more than moral failing.



That's not the way it reads to me. The NRSV translates the verse as "for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ..." "Because of him who subjected it" or "by the will of the one who subjected it" follows the statement "not of its own will". The creation is futile, not because it chose to be, but because "the one who subjected it"---which, as I said earlier, the "in hope" clause makes quite clear is God---so willed it.



Not necessarily. There are lots of things that it is wrong for a human being to do that it's not wrong for God to do. Cf. the parable of the landowner and the laborers in Matthew 20; the landowner, who represents God in the story, justifies himself by saying, "Can't I do what I like with my own money?" If Adam had subjected the creation to decay, this would have been overstepping his role, since he was set in the garden as its gardener, not as its owner. But if God did, who has a right to complain? Because it's God's to do with as he likes.


Yes, but.


I think that the "groaning" (and let's not forget that it's not groaning in general, but "groaning in labor pains until now") is the same thing as "wait[ing] with eager longing" in verse 19, right before the "for" in the verse about the creation being "subjected to futility", which clearly isn't just some outgrowth of human sin.


So long as it's clear enough to follow. I just picked that "nit" out because earlier in this thread I went on a tangent and explained the proper usage of the verbs "effect" and "affect."


The first half of that (whether Adam, not God, subjected creation to futility) is in fact the very point under debate, and the second (whether it was his perogative to do so) is an unsupported assumption. (I'll grant that it might have been within his power to do so, given the "creation" or "dominion mandate" (depending on which school of thought is discussing it), but certainly not his rights. But this point isn't really relevant.)

And, as I've said before, it's fairly clear to me that "the ground" is a shorthand way of referring to creation as a whole---which means that this certainly does explain why the whole of creation is "subject to futility."

(And, by the way, after looking at the Romans 8 passage more closely, what leaps out to me is that having been subjected to futility is the reason why creation is "wait[ing] with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God" and "has been groaning with labor pains until now", not another way of saying those things.)


But God doesn't "curse Adam" so that his work will be largely futile, he curses the ground because of Adam, and then describes what that curse will entail for Adam.

(I snip discussion of death of plants and of the connection between blood and life.)

Quite.


No ... but you're the only one who's mentioned "subjecting" the creation "to sin" or "to evil" (if memory serves). What the Romans passage talks about is subjecting it to futility---of which thorns, to a farmer, would be one of the most immediately obvious examples.


Sin is certainly primarily actions contrary to God's commands. But it also includes the (inherited) tendency toward sin. (Not that this is immediately relevant here.)

However, your statement that evil can't "constitute a substance or force" reinforces my statement immediately above that the creation wasn't subjected to "evil" or "sin" but rather to futility.


As I said earlier, we were present; this is the very principle that Paul explicitly assumes when he says in 1 Corinthians 15 that "since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead; as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive."


That's certainly not the only possible explanation; one could argue that as Eve's "head" and husband he was responsible for her actions as well as his own, or that since the command was given to him before she was created it didn't apply to her, or simply that God decided to punish Adam harshly and Eve more leniently. And it's also not clear that God didn't hold Eve accountable. He didn't say "cursed are you" to either of them, and other than "cursed is the ground" the rest of his speech to each of them was a description of how things would be for them in the future: pain in childbirth for her, futility and hard work in farming for him. I'm not at all sure which (if any) of these explanations is correct, but it's simply not true that Adam's dominion over the entire universe is the only explanation for that question.



Mmm ... God commands Adam and Eve to "be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth"; they're given explicit dominion over the animals, and commanded to "fill" and "subdue" the earth, but I don't get any grant of ownership from that passage, or from the statement in chapter 2 that God put the man in the garden "to till it and keep it".


Nod. Though you are arguing with me, it's not combative, or personal, so far.

*sets up lawn chair and gets popcorn* This is a really interesting discussion.

I was going to start a thread that among other things tackled the initial question in this thread, but I see that Lycanis beat me to the punch. And considering the discussion that ensued from that question, I'm glad it was on Lycanis' thread and not mine. I'd have been less patient So thanks Lycanis!

Awesome! Glad my thread could be of service.