ORIGINAL
312
ORIGINAL
mistaken at a later period for a decree of the actual
CBCumenical council.
Besides the works cited in the body of the article, the following may be consulted: on the life, works, and theolog>' of Origen: HuET. Origcniamt in P. G., XVII; Redepenning, Origenes (Bonn, 1841-6).
On the recent works concerning Origen, see Ehrhard. Die aUechristliche I.illeralur und ihre Brforschung von 1SSJ,-1900 (Frei- burg. 1900). 320-51.
On Origon's doctrine; BlOG, The Christian Platonists of Alex- andria (Oxford. 1<SS6); Fairweather. Origen and Greek Patristic Theology (Edinburgh. 1901); Freppel, Origlne (Paris. 186S); Denis, La philosophie d'Origtne (Paris. 1884); Capitaine. Dc Origenis ethica (Miinster, 1898); Prat, Origkne, le th^ologien et I'ejrfgete (Paris. 1907).
The best edition of Origen's works is the one in course of pubH- cation by the Academy of Sciences of BerHn; the following works have appeared: De martyrio. Contra Celsum, De oratione by Kotschau (2 vols.. Leipzig, 1899) ; Twenty Homilies on Jeremias, Homily on the Witch of Endor, and Fragments by Klostermann (Leipzig, 1901); Commentary on St, John (nine books and frag- ments) by Preuscben (Leipzig. 1903). For the still unedited texts of the Pbilocalia there is the excellent edition of Robinson (Cambridge. 1893). There is an English translation of the De principiis and the Contra Celsum bv Crombie in Ante-Nicene Christian Library. Edinburgh, X (1869) and XXIII (1872); a translation of the Commentaries on St, Matthew and on St, John by Menzies in the supplementary vol. (1897) of the same collection.
F. Pr.\t.
Original Sin. — I. Meaning; II. Principal Adver- saries; III. Original Sin in Scripture; IV. Original Sin in Tradition; V. Original Sin in face of the Ob- jections of Human Reason; VI. Nature of Original Sin; VI 1. How Voluntary.
I. Meaning. — Original sin tnay be taken to mean: (1) the sin that Adam committed; (2) a consequence of this first sin, the hereditary stain with which we are born on account of our origin or descent from Adam. From the earliest times the latter sense of the word was more common, as may be seen by St. Augustine's statement: "the deliberate sin of the First man is the cause of original sin" (De nupt. et concup., 11, xxvi, 43). It is the hereditary stain that is dealt with here. As to the sin of Adam we have not to examine the circumstances in which it was committed nor to make the exegesis of the third chapter of Genesis.
II. Principal Adversaries. — Theodorus of Mop- suestia opened this controversy by denying that the sin of Adam was the origin of death. (See the " Exccrpta Theodori", by Marius Mercator; cf. Smith, "A Dic- tionary of Christian Biography ", IV, 942.) Celestius, a friend of Pelagius, was the first in the West to hold these propositions, borrowed from Theodorus: "Adam was to die in every hypothesis, whether he sinned or did not sin. His sin injured himself only and not the human race" (Mercator, "Liber Subnotationum", preface) . This, the first position held by the Pelagians, was also the first point condemned at Carthage (Den- zinger, "Enchiridion", no 101 — old no. 6.5). Again.st this fundamental error Catholics cited especially Rom., V, 12, where Adam is shown as transmitting death with sin. After some time the Pelagians ad- mitted the transmission of death — this being more easily understood as we see that parents transmit to their children hereditary diseases — but they still violently attacked the transmission of sin (St. Au- gustine, "C/Ontra duas epist. Pelag.", IV, iv, 6). And when St. Paul speaks of the transmission of sin they understood by this the transmission of death. This was their second position, condemned by the Council of Orange [Denz., n. 175 (14.5)], and again later on with the first by the Council of Trent [Sess. V, can. ii; Denz., n. 789 (671)). To take the word sin to mean death was an evident falsification of the text, so the Pelagians soon abandoned the interpretation and admitted that Adam caused sin in us. They did not, however, understand by sin t he hereditary stain con- tracted at our birth, but the sin that adults commit in imitation of Adam. This was their third position, to which is opposed the definition of Trent that sin is transmitted to all by generation (propagatione), not by imitation [Denz., n. 790 (672)]. Moreover, in the fol- lowing canon are cited the words of the Council of
Carthage, in which there is question of a.sin contracted
by general ion :iii(l ('IT:ic(m1 byrcgenerati()n]D(!nz.,n. 102
(66)]. The lc;i(lrrs of the Reformation admitted the
dogma of origin;il sin, but at present there are many
Protestants imbued with Socinian doctrines whose
theory is a revival of Pelagianism.
111. Original Sin in Scripture. — The classical text is Rom., v, 12 sqq. In the preceding part the Apostle treats of justification by Jesus Christ, ;inil to put in evidence the fact of His being the one Saviour, he contr:isls with this Divine Head of m.ankind the huni;ni lii'ad who cau.sed its ruin. The question of origin:il sin, therefore, comes in only incidentally. St. Paul supposes the idea that the faithful \v.i\c, of it from his oral instructions, and he speaks of it to make them understand the work of Redemption. This explains the brevity of the development and the ob- scurity of some verses. We shall now show what, in the text, is opposed to the three Pelagian positions:
(1) The sin of Adam has injured the human race at least in the sense that it has introducctl death — • "Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men". Here there is question of physical death. First, the literal meaning of the word ought to be presumed unless there be some reason to the contrary. Second, there is an allusion in this verse to a passage in the Book of Wisdom in which, as may be seen from the context, there is question of physical death. Wis., ii, 24: "But by the envy of the devil death came into the world". Cf. Gen., ii, 17; iii, .3, 19; and another parallel passage in St. Paul himself, I Cor., xv, 21: "For by a man came death and by a man the resur- rection of the dead ". Here there can be question only of physical death, since it is opposed to corporal resur- rection, which is the subject of the whole chapter.
(2) Adam by his fault transmitted to us not only death but also sin — "for as by the disobedience of one man many [i. e., all men] were made sinners" (Rom., V, 19). How then could the Pelagians, and at a later period Zwingh, say that St. Paul speaks only of the transmission of physical death? If according to them we must read death where the Apostle wrote sin, we should also read that the disobedience of Adam has made us mortal where the Apostle writes that it has made us sinners. But the word sinner has never meant mortal, nor has sin ever meant death. Also in verse 12, which corresponds to verse 19, we see that by one man two things have been brought on all men, sin and death, the one being tlie consequence of the other and therefore not identical with it.
(3) Since Adam transmits death to his children by way of generation when he begets them mortal, it is by generation also that he transmits to them sin, for the Apostle presents these two effects as produced at the same time and by the same causality. The ex- planation of the Pelagians differs from that of St. Paul. According to them the child who receive^ mortality at his birth receives sin from Adam only at a later period when he knows the sin of the first man and is inclined to imitate it. The causality of Adam as re- gards mortality would, therefore, be completely differ- ent from his causality as regards sin. Moreover, this supposed influence of the bad example of Adam is almost chimerical; even the faithful when they sin do not sin on account of Adam's b.ad examjile, a fortiori infidels who are completely ignorant of the history of the first man. And yet all men are, by the influence of Adam, sinners and condomni'd (Horn., v, 18, 19). The influence of Adam cannot, tlicrcfore, be the influence of his bad example which we imitate (Augustine, "Contra .Julian.", VI, xxiv, 7.5).
On this account, several recent Protestants have thus modified the Pelagian explanation: "Even with- out being aware of it all men imitate Adam inasmuch as they merit death as the punishment of their own sins just as Adam merited it as the punishment for his
