dizerner wrote:But I don't see it as "inherited guilt," I see it as "inherited death." ... And I don't see that as "extraneous" but a fundamental Gospel truth.
I thought you held to a definition of "original sin" which included universal inherited guilt. That is what I said seems extraneous to me ("But the idea of inherited guilt (i.e., our collective guilt for Adam/Eve's sin) seems extraneous (at best).") If that is not your view, then I don't think we have any major disagreement, which is good.
dizerner wrote:He clearly says Levi was "in his loins" when he tithed. You realize I was not drawing a direct parallel but an indirect parallel, right?
I'm not sure. I thought you were saying that the principal from
Heb 7 is that children are personally involved in and/or responsible for their parents' behavior before the children exist. I was trying to show that that is not necessarily, or even likely, what the writer meant to say.
dizerner wrote:Also to me it's not a case of responsibility but being effected by something. If one man pushes the button to a nuclear warhead, we won't be culpable for it but it will fundamentally affect us.
I don't think anyone has a problem with that idea. Children often suffer because of their parents' sin and punishment. I guess I misunderstood how
you define "original sin". There are different definitions of the concept, as you know, and I thought you held to
Augustine's view (i.e., that "Original sin, according to Augustine, consists of the guilt of Adam which all humans inherit."). If not, then ... that's good, I think.
dizerner wrote:Adam only had one Law in the garden, and had he kept it, there would be no Law of Moses or need for redemption.
General comment to all: What if Adam had was unkind to Eve or had illicit sexual relations or over-ate, etc.? Wouldn't those things have been immoral, too? It's that line of thinking that made me tend to think that the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" and the eating of its fruit are symbolical rather than literal (though I can't see how it matters one way or the other).