‘Born Sinners’ Striving for Perfection: Criteria for the Construction of a Contemporary Lutheran Theology of Original Sin

Abstract : This essay aims to identify some criteria Lutheran theology must meet when working towards a new construction of human imperfection. It must be contextual and open towards a dialogue with disciplines seeking knowledge of human nature. Theology must take evil and suffering seriously, while still recognizing humanity's ability to make life better. It must affirm that not only human nature, but also human culture needs transformation.     

Evolution, Sociobiology, and the Atonement

This essay views Christian doctrines of the atonement in the light of evolution and sociobiology. It argues that most of the doctrines are false because they use a false premise, the historicity of Adam and the Fall. However, two doctrines are not false on those grounds: Abelard's idea that Jesus' life is an example and Athanasius' concept that the atonement changes human nature. Employing evolution's and sociobiology's concepts of the egocentric and ethnocentric nature of humanity and the synergy between genes and environments to produce a "nature," this essay shows that these two doctrines can be amalgamated to make sense of the atonement in the late twentieth century.     

America and the Eighth Deadly Sin

In this article, I argue that the cultivation of innocence in the United States, coupled with policies of free market expansionism, the acquisitiveness of capitalism, rising militarism, the hubris of democratic evangelism, free market fundamentalism, and the immense U.S. militaristic and economic power, is an especially fatal sin. In general, I contend that nurturing innocence involves overlooking the inadvertent and advertent destruction and suffering that has resulted from U.S. interventionist policies and actions in the 20th and 21st centuries. Finally, I argue that the cultivation of innocence, which is often supported by Christian theological language, contradicts central Christian beliefs. Dr. LaMothe has published two books, Revitalizing Faith through Pastoral Counseling and Becoming Alive: Psychoanalysis and Vitality as well as numerous articles, Correspondence to Ryan LaMothe, rlamothe@saintmeainrad.edu     

Sociobiology and Human Nature: A Perspective from Catholic Theology

This paper addresses a nonspecialist audience on how sociobiological accounts of human nature might be relevant to Christian theology. I begin with some confessional remarks to clarify what I mean by Christian theology and how I understand it to be related to science. I indicate briefly why sociobiology might be of interest to theology and then move on to sketch some ways in which sociobiology might relate to theological ethics. My basic point is that sociobiology is directly relevant to theological ethics in its understanding of evolved human emotional predispositions but not in its normative reflection proper.     

Entropy,the Fall,and Tillich: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Original Sin

The focus of this paper is to present a bridge between the theological notion of original sin and the scientific concept of entropy. Physics has firmly established that the universe is moving towards increasing entropy, whereby the cosmos is in a state of decay and growing disorder. At the same time, traditional theology has perceived that the world is in a state of chaos, resulting from the sin of Adam and Eve. While these notions have a number of significant similarities, the causal explanation for both theories poses a problem for any correlation between the two. Theology has struggled to explain how human action produced entropic phenomena without enacting anachronistic explanations that discount scientific data. This paper intends to close the gap by positing the principle of entropy as an existential dynamic of the Fall, thus reasserting the universality of original sin and evading the narrowness of anthropocentrism. Paul Tillich's interpretation of the Fall provides important insights that can affirm the corrosion of the world from a scientific and a theological perspective, potentially bringing these two disciplines into a position for a more fruitful dialogue.     

CHRISTIANITY AND EVOLUTIONARY ETHICS: SKETCH TOWARD A RECONCILIATION

Abstract. Evolutionary ethics posits the evolution of dispositions to love self, kin, and friend. Christianity claims that God's ethical demand is to love one's neighbor. I argue that the distance between these two positions can be interpreted theologically as original sin, the disposition to disobey God's command and practice self-love and nepotism rather than neighbor-love. Original sin requires Incarnation and Atonement to unite God and humanity. The ancient doctrine of the Atonement as educative does not invoke the Fall. Its revival may help reconcile Christianity and evolutionary ethics.     

Sin, sickness, and salvation.

This article seeks to provide commentary and rationale for Orthodox Christian rites and prayers for the sick as found in the Euchologion, or Book of Needs. The reader needs to understand that the prayers of the Orthodox Church prayed at times of sickness and suffering will often strike the non-Orthodox as harsh and even unjust. References to God willing suffering do not sit well with most Western Christians. However, this is the Orthodox Christian belief, and it is expressed in the prayers of the Orthodox Church. Sickness and suffering are understood to be avenues of salvation and a participation in the glory and joys of the resurrection of Christ and life in the Kingdom of God. This is why the Orthodox Church teaches her faithful to accept suffering as something that has the potential to bring them further along in the process of theosis.     

Sociobiology and Moral Discourse

In the intellectual lineage of sociobiology (understood as evolutionary social science), this article considers the place of moral discourse in the evolution of emergent systems for mediating behavior. Given that humans share molecular systems, reflex systems, drive systems, emotional systems, and cognitive systems with chimpanzees, why is it that human behavior is so radically different from chimpanzee behavior? The answer is that, unlike chimps, humans possess symbolic systems, empowering them to override chimplike default morality in favor of symbolically mediated moral codes. The article concludes with a brief discussion of the power of religious symbols to influence moral behavior by reprogramming emotional systems.     

利他主义:从社会生物学到社会科学

对自然界和人类社会中广泛存在的利他行为,社会生物学在动物行为研究的基础上提出几种假说,并把它推进到人类行为领域,由此引发与其他学科,尤其是社会科学众多解释模式之间的争论。造成分歧的主要原因不仅是利他行为本身的复杂性和多样性,更主要的是不同学科范式之间,以及这些范式所秉承的研究传统和学科目标之间的差异。对利他行为合理的科学解释必须放弃由于学科分割而造成的门户之见,把客观现象的人为分裂重新整合起来。这种学科间的整合不同于以往意义上研究方法的交叉与互补,而是要在“生物——社会”层面建立一个关于人类行为的全新的理论架构。     

A Retrospective on Sociobiology

Zygon has been discussing the implications of sociobiology for twenty-five years, ever since E. O. Wilson's book by that name first burst upon the stage. In the course of that discussion there have been many heated exchanges, but in this journal, at least, the heat has also generated light. Thus it is now timely and useful to review and consolidate Zygon 's approach to the sociobiology construct, not only as it was originally presented but as it has changed over time. The goal of this article is to recapitulate and summarize the dialogue that has taken place here. But my aim is not merely to rehash the discussion; it is more precisely to extend and continue it. Specific proposals are offered that are designed to ground future conversations on the solid foundation that has been established over the last quarter century.     

TEILHARD DE CHARDIN,THE “SIX PROPOSITIONS,” AND THE HOLY OFFICE

Between 1924 and 1937, the Jesuit Curia in Rome repeatedly placed restrictions on what Jesuit priest‐paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was allowed to write on those aspects of human origins that, in the view of the Curia, had theological as well as scientific aspects. In 2018, David Grumett and Paul Bentley published an account of the first of those restrictions, together with a previously undiscovered document associated with that restriction. This article corrects a relatively important error in their historical narrative, offers an alternative to their comments about the case, and concludes by embedding the events of 1924–1925 in a slightly larger history of Teilhard's relations with the Jesuit Curia and with the Holy Office. That larger narrative shows that, while Grumett and Bentley's account was mistaken about the involvement of the Holy Office in the case they discuss, it was not wrong about the concerns of that Congregation in questions of human origins.     

Sin, suffering, and the need for the theological virtues.

This article examines the account of the relationship between sin and suffering provided by J. L. A. Garcia in "Sin and Suffering in a Catholic Understanding of Medical Ethics," in this issue. Garcia draws on the (Roman) Catholic tradition and particularly on the thought of Thomas Aquinas, who remains an important resource for Catholic theology. Nevertheless, his interpretation of Thomas is open to criticism, both in terms of omissions and in terms of positive claims. Garcia includes those elements of Thomas that are purely philosophical, such as natural law and acquired virtue, but neglects the theological and infused virtues, the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit, and the beatitudes. These omissions distort his account of the Christian life so that he underplays both the radical problem posed by sin (and suffering), and the radical character of the ultimate solution: redemption in Christ through the grace of the Holy Spirit.     

Albert Pighius's Controversial Work on Original Sin

Abstract

Pighius's Controversies were first published in 1541 and apparently went through nine separate editions by 1586, although one of these never existed and two others incorporate copies of earlier editions. The first of the sixteen ‘controversies’, on original sin, proved to be controversial and was later branded as semi-Pelagian. Pighius had it printed on his way from the Worms to the Regensburg Colloquy, but was prevented from publishing the volume until after the collapse of the latter. He announced that he had been displeased with the first printed version and that he had had the first signature reprinted. The Cambridge University Library has a copy of the first edition with two different A signatures, the first of these being a unique and hitherto unnoticed examplar of the earlier, cancelled, printing. This copy also contains two hand-written notes banning the publication of the first controversy for the time being. The most likely explanation is that Nicholas Granvella, the imperial chancellor, wrote these notes, banning (until the conclusion of the Regensburg Colloquy) first the publication of the first controversy and later the publication of the entire first volume of the Controversies, comprising the first nine controversies. The article concludes with the cancelled text, collated with the text found in all of the later versions.     

How Sin Works: A Review Essay

Levinas's ethics of other-centered service has been criticized at the theoretical level for failing to offer a conception of moral agency adequate to ground its imperative and at the practical level for encouraging self- hatred. Levinas's explicit resistance to the incorporation of the phrase as yourself in the Judaeo-Christian love command might seem to validate the critics' complaints. The author argues, on the contrary, that Levinas does offer a strong and compelling conception of moral agency and that his ethics, properly understood, does not entail self-abnegation. Levinas's attempt to counter excessive and manipulative self-concern and self-inflation by insisting on the dependent and situational position of the self has been wrongly overinterpreted as an abandonment of the self and its just claims. The author seeks to establish a more balanced understanding by focusing attention on the ethics of welcome, on Levinas's distinctive conception of passivity, and on the role of the third in all human relations.     

Narcissism, Spiritual Pride, and Original Sin

Narcissism has roots in childhood and a broad impact on society. Parental abuse, neglect, or exploitation result in unmet emotional needs that leave low self-esteem and patterns of longing for affirmation. When these needs are not gratified, interpersonal conflict ensues. At the extreme, torture, wars, and other conflagrations can be seen to have roots in narcissism, which is thus construed as the psychological explanation for what religion defines as original sin. The cold, dark pain of narcissistic woundedness comprises an abyss in the soul. Spiritual resources, including mysticism and surrender to divine love, may offer deep healing for those wounds.     

Regress and the Doctrine of Epistemic Original Sin

Existing solutions to the epistemic regress problem, and the theories of justification built upon them, are inadequate, for they fail to diagnose the root source of the problem. The problem is rooted in our attachment to a pernicious dogma of modern epistemology: the idea that a judgement must be supported by some kind of reason or evidence to be justified. The epistemic analogue of the doctrine of original sin, this idea renders every judgement in need of redemption – guilty until shown to be innocent – distorting our understanding of reason at a very deep level, and preventing us from conceptualizing a satisfactory solution to the problem. If we opt for a more context–sensitive mechanism for assigning default epistemic status, however, we get a more plausible picture of justification, an epistemology more in tune with epistemic practice, and an elegant solution to the regress problem.