Original Sin

This is a short primer on the meaning of ‘original sin’ as opposed to its history. Original sin is best thought of as the name we give to our estrangement from God. Since this estrangement is a metaphysical estrangement rather than an everyday, commonsense separation, the term describes a metaphysical rather than a psychological or moral condition.

 

It is unfortunate that the name includes the word ‘sin’ which is generally taken to mean doing (relatively) bad things. Original sin has nothing to do with this sort of sin, except that such sinning can be seen as a consequence of original sin. So, all other things being equal, the best human imaginable is as much a victim of original sin as the worst. We are all original sinners.

 

Since original sin is the estrangement of humanity from God, this is the problem for humanity. And, for Christianity, the solution to this problem is the death and resurrection of Jesus. The problem is a metaphysical one and accordingly, so is the solution. Which is why neither problem nor solution make any everyday sense. Why should I suffer for something that I haven’t done? What use, to me, now, is someone dying and then coming back from the dead 2,000 years ago?

 

The problem that Christianity sets itself to solve is described in chapters 2 and 3 of Genesis. So mercifully, the whole thing is wrapped up in those couple of chapters and the passages in the Gospels about the death and resurrection of Jesus. Chapter 1 of Genesis also includes an account of the creation of humanity but since it doesn’t detail a Fall, it’s not really relevant, so it will be ignored here.

 

Clearly, the Genesis account is not a literal one. Humans were not formed from clay figurines, there was no Garden of Eden, through which a God the Father liked to saunter in the evening. Nor was there a tree of knowledge of Good and Evil or a cunning serpent, and so on. It is a mythic, poetic account, the meaning of which is important, not the literal details. Fortunately, the meaning of the account is quite clear. God takes a bit of clay and forms Adam from it. Obviously, the clay figurine is lifeless. So, God breathes his own spirit (ruach) into it and the figure comes to life. This is the first incarnation. God freely places his spirit within the restricted point of view of the creature Adam (Vedantaists may compare Brahman and Atman here). The life of the creature is the life of God.

 

And this life was fine, except it was probably a bit boring. To be a story worth hearing, there needs to be some irruption in the daily cycle of life, something about which there can be a story. And God sets out to achieve this. The trouble with being God is that you know everything that’s ever happened and everything that is going to happen, so it’s a bit difficult to surprise yourself. Adam as he was – God looking out through the eyes of a clay figurine – was not going to be tricked by a sly old serpent: “Hello, Lucifer, lovely day, eh? No fruit for me today, thank you.” So, God puts his self in the clay figurine to sleep (or in a trance). He purposefully forgets who he is and dreams that he is not God, but the inhabitant of a body. He is no longer creator but part of creation. We can see this because he is now aware of and concerned about all the relative values of the world. He knows about what is good and evil for him; he learns to distinguish other polarities such as male and female; and finally he learns about the most significant duality, from which all others flow, of him and not him. From this follows the polarity of life and death, and as God had previously explained (not threatened), if you are alive, you will die, since the two go together. So eating of the fruit does bring death, because as with all dualities, you can’t have one without the other (you can’t have all up and no down).

 

This voluntary forgetting is the original sin, for it is from that that the story of humanity arises. A number of analogies are used here, it is like being in a dream or trance, or God is like an actor in a play who is so immersed in their part that they forget that it is just a play and they are just an actor. There is no point in asking why this has happened and expecting a literal answer. As humans, we only know the lines of the play, and we cannot peer outside of the play to see why it might have been written. All our language is within the play; we do not know the words for what happens outside (“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9). So we can but resort to our analogies, or keep silent. Within these analogies, it is generally held that God freely decided to do this (he was not forced by necessity or otherwise, nor was it a mistake), though the apophatic “neither freely nor not freely” (for neither is appropriate) should always be remembered.

 

And this has consequences for how we end our estrangement with God. Firstly it must be said that the goodest good news is that we are not estranged from God, but only dream we are. For we are “God asleep” and as you cannot be fundamentally estranged from yourself, we are not fundamentally alienated from God. Secondly, it is God’s choice to forget who he is, so there is nothing wrong in this forgetting. God chooses to forget and God chooses to remember. So you may read this piece, think it sounds reasonable, and then totally forget it (or you may think it’s barking mad and totally forget it). It may not be for you, or it may not be for you now, but in 20 years time. But thirdly, this explains why you can’t do anything (why original sin can be seen as so discapacitating). The you who wants to save your self and reunite it with God is but a dream figure or a character in a play (pick your analogy), not someone able to do things. Put simply, you can’t save yourself because you (as a free-willing agent) don’t exist. Thus one depends upon grace – the undeserved favour of God – which cannot be forced or cajoled or bribed or tricked. You feel as if you should be able to do something, for the performance is a very good one and you seem so life-like, but all you are is a trick of “your” memory and anticipation.

 

All this is just words, a reading of an old text, which is no good to you as it stands. The story has to be about you and be felt to be about you. I would suggest that the best way of doing this is via the experiments of Douglas Harding. Any book (or article e.g. see The Headless Way) by him will do – they all ask the same question: Who really are you? If you point to any object (or idea or anything), the object will exclude another in some way. This is most obvious with solid objects, but it even applies to ideas or emotions – one thing gets in the way of another in some fashion. The only thing that this doesn’t apply to, is you. You don’t get in the way of things, rather the opposite: you’re space for things to be. If you point to yourself, you’re pointing to a void in which things exist. But the void isn’t a thing, it’s what allows things to be. Metaphysically, it’s of a different order than things, and that’s why original sin is metaphysical rather than “physical” where here ‘physical’ just means things of any and every sort of the natural world.

 

That’s the explanation, the theory. But what matters is seeing it for yourself. Seeing it once is good and fine, but ideally you should try to live with a consciousness of this void all the time. Doing that is very hard – we’re all original sinners most of the time – but if grace is given, that’s how we should live.

 

Another way of putting all this is the Christian story of the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus. That is a symbolization of seeing and living from the void that is your true nature. Again we have an incarnation (all humans are an incarnation of God), but this time, instead of forgetting who he really was, Jesus remembers. This is symbolized by the crucifixion as the death of the imagined self (or putting it in its rightful place) and the resurrection and ascension as the remembrance of one’s true nature. They are a physical symbolization of the metaphysical truth. Whether the events actually occurred or not doesn’t matter, since it’s the meaning for you not a physical event elsewhere and elsewhen which matters. Everyone is an incarnation, and what matters is whether you see this or not.