The Fall & Sin

God brings about every man's lot, and all the parts of it. He sits at the helm of human affairs, and turns them about in whatever way he lists. "Whatever the Lord pleased, that He did in heaven and in earth, in the seas and all deep places." There is not anything whatever befalls us without his overruling hand. The same providence that brought us out of the womb, brings us to, and fixes us in the condition and place allotted for us, by him who "has determined the times and the bounds of our habitation." It overrules the smallest and most casual things about us, such as "hairs of our head being all numbered;" a "lot cast into the lap." Yea, the free acts of our will, by which we choose for ourselves: for even "the king's heart is in the hand of the Lord, as rivers of water."

The Lord God omnipotent reigneth. His government is exercised over inanimate matter, over the brute beasts, over the children of men, over angels good and evil, and over Satan himself. No revolving world, no shining of star, no storm, no creature moves, no actions of men, no errands of angels, no deeds of Devil—nothing in all the vast universe can come to pass otherwise than God has eternally purposed. Here is a foundation of faith. Here is a resting place for the intellect. Here is an anchor for the soul, both sure and steadfast. It is not blind fate, unbridled evil, man or Devil, but the Lord Almighty who is ruling the world, ruling it according to His own good pleasure and for His own eternal glory.

Of the author of sin, we confess that our Lord God, though He is the creator and sustainer of all creatures, yet He is not the author of sin. It is rather the evil will, both in the Devil and in the godless human, that, when he does not obtain help from the Lord God, turns away from God, as Christ speaks in John 8, “When the Devil speaks a lie, he speaks of his own, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (v. 44).

God might, indeed, by his absolute power, prevent evil; but he will not wrong and despoil his own creature, man, whom he created righteous and holy. He acts with man in a manner that corresponds with the nature with which he has endowed him. Hence he proposes laws to which he attaches rewards and punishments—he commands us to embrace the good and shun the evil; and that we may do this, he both grants his grace, without which we can do nothing, and also encourages our diligence and labor. But if a man come short of doing what he ought, his sin and negligence are chargeable upon himself, and not upon God, although God had the power to prevent it, and yet did not.

It is true that nature has received a mortal wound, but there is a great difference between a wound inflicted from without, and one inherent in our first condition. It is plain that this wound was inflicted by sin; and, therefore, we have no ground of complaint except against ourselves.

We say, then, that man is corrupted by a natural viciousness, but not by one which proceeded from nature. In saying that it proceeded not from nature, we mean that it was rather an adventitious event which befell man, than a substantial property assigned to him from the beginning.

Nor does he become the author of sin by his providence, because that lawlessness is nothing except a defect of operation, of which there cannot exist an author or efficient cause, but only a deficient cause, for which reason alone, the author of sin, insofar as it is such, is the creature, by its transgressing of the law.

To make God the author of sin is such foul blasphemy, that it can never enter any Christian man’s mind without a shudder. It is indeed true that God had made man mutably good, had infallibly foreseen his sin, had foreordained the permission of the sin and given man no doubt sufficient strength to shun sin, but inoperable without His influx; that meanwhile He had inflowed into man’s faculties for natural actions by not inflowing into the moral entity of such actions. … But it is not less true, that God neither is nor could in any way become the author of sin.

Not unto God; he is not the author of sin, nor tempts unto it; nor is he tempted by it: nor to Satan, only as an instrument, enticing and deceiving; but to themselves, to their own will, it was their own act and deed.

Yes, there is even in ourselves sin and corruption enough, so that there is no need that God should infuse into us either a new or greater measure of wickedness. Therefore, when God is said in the Scripture to harden (Ex. 7:13), to blind (John 12:40) and to deliver us up into a reprobate sense (Rom. 1:28), it is to be understood that God does it by just judgment, as a just judge and avenger.

First, the offering of occasions which can be procured only by the peculiar providence of God by the concourse of circumstances and the proposition of objects, fitted to move faculties constituted in this or that way (in which manner God does not infuse wickedness into the minds of men, but draws out into action the wickedness latent there).

Now although souls are created by God destitute of original righteousness, God cannot on that account be considered the author of sin. It is one thing to infuse impurity; another not to give the purity of which man has rendered himself unworthy in Adam.

For understanding this point, how the providence of God reacheth to and is concerned in sinful actions, we are to consider, that God neither puts evil into the hearts of men, nor stirs them up to it: for, says the apostle, Jam. 1:13. 'God cannot be tempted with evil; neither tempteth he any man.' And therefore he is not the author of sin.

However, this is certain, that God doth not infuse it. Souls receive neither purity nor impurity from him, but only their naked essence, and the natural powers and properties flowing therefrom. He doth not infuse any impurity into men; for he cannot be the author of sin, who is the revenger of it. … As a pure and holy God, he cannot infuse any impurity into the souls of men; and as a just and righteous God, he may and doth withhold from, or create them void and destitute of, that holiness and righteousness which was once their happiness and glory.

In order to account for a sinful corruption of nature, yea, a total native depravity of the heart of man, there is not the least need of supposing any evil quality, infused, implanted, or wrought into the nature of man, by any positive cause, or influence whatsoever, either from God, or the creature; or of supposing, that man is conceived and born with a fountain of evil in his heart, such as is any thing properly positive.

And just as he that wishes to punish someone by fumigating with a foul smell, sulfur and dung, does not put a foul smell into the sulfur and dung (it already is there), so God, when He punishes sins through the devil and the vessels of wrath with sins, does not put any sin into them, but it is there naturally since the fall in the devil and in men (Eph. 4; Rom. 1).

But He is not the author of the evil dispositions with which that nature is infected at birth. The doctrine of original sin attributes no efficiency to God in the production of evil. It simply supposes that He judicially abandons our apostate race, and withholds from the descendants of Adam the manifestations of his favour and love, which are the life of the soul.

God hardens some men's hearts, as he did Pharaoh's, and he wills to harden them, or he hardens them according to his decreeing will; "Whom he will he hardens", (Romans 9:18) this he does not by any positive act, by infusing hardness and blindness into the hearts of men; which is contrary to his purity and holiness, and would make him the author of sin; but by leaving men to their natural blindness and hardness of heart; for the understanding is naturally darkened; and there is a natural blindness, hardness, and callousness of heart, through the corruption of nature, and which is increased by habits of sinning.

God is said to blind and to harden men not only negatively (by not enlightening and softening) and privatively (by withdrawing his grace whatever it may have been after men have abused it) and permissively (by not hindering), but also positively. Not by bringing in blindness or hardness (which is natural to man), but both objectively by presenting external objects to them which although ordained to another direction by their own nature, yet he knows will be drawn in a different way by their vice; and judicially by smiting them internally with blindness (the light which they abused being taken away or extinguished); and by loosening the reins to their lusts and delivering them up and enslaving them to Satan.

Thus God is said to harden men, not by positive hardening, or working anything in the creature, but by not working, not softening, leaving a man to the hardness of his own heart, whereby it is unavoidable, by the depravation of man’s nature, and the fury of his passions, but that he should be further hardened. … If you put fire near to wax or resin, both will melt; but when the fire is removed, they return to their natural quality of hardness and brittleness. The positive act of the fire is to melt and soften, and the softness of the rosin is to be ascribed to that, but the hardness is from the resin itself, wherein the fire hath no influence, but only a negative act by a removal of it; so when God hardens a man, he only leaves him to that stony heart which he derived from Adam, and brought with him into the world.

Suitably upon the will and affections he hath several acts, -- obfirming the one in corruption, and giving up the other to vileness, Rom. 1:24, 26, until the heart become thoroughly hardened, and the conscience seared; not forcing the one, but leaving it to follow the judgment of practical reason, -- which being a blind, yea, a blinded guide, whither can it lead a blind follower, but into the ditch? -- not defiling the other with infused sensuality, but provoking them to act according to inbred, native corruption, and by suffering frequent vile actings to confirm them in ways of vileness.

For in those people God did not make the common sins but found them there, as we have noted before. And although God, in his just but to us hidden judgment, does abandon and harden them more and more (Romans 9:18), yet it is they who by their own free choice first become hardened (Romans 11:7) and abandon the benefits of general providence; they abuse God’s longsuffering, as Paul testifies in Romans 1:18, 26, and 28.

As for those wicked and ungodly men whom God, as a righteous judge, for former sins, doth blind and harden; from them He not only withholdeth his grace, whereby they might have been enlightened in their understandings, and wrought upon in their hearts; but sometimes also withdraweth the gifts which they had, and exposeth them to such objects as their corruption makes occasions of sin; and withal, gives them over to their own lusts, the temptations of the world, and the power of Satan.

In evil actions, however, he so concurs as neither to effect, assist, nor approve of them, but to permit and efficaciously direct; not by infusing wickedness, but by so determining rational creatures physically to the substance of the act in the genus of being, that they (when left to themselves failing from the law) move and determine themselves to bad actions in the genus of morals, performing them freely and voluntarily (hekousiōs). Hence the guilt rests upon them alone.

Yet we are able to reconcile them easily enough, if we distinguish within sin its material element, namely, the habit or act that is the substrate of the wickedness, with which, inasmuch as it is physically good, God is not able not to concur as the efficient cause, without casting aside his own independence (Acts 17:28; Rom. 11:36), and its formal element, lawlessness (1 John 3:4), through which the act or habit is sin, whose author he cannot be, because the one set above all law cannot transgress the law.

The power of action is from God, but the viciousness of that action from our own nature. As when a clock or watch hath some fault in any of the wheels, the man that winds it up, or putting his hand upon the wheels moves them, he is the cause of the motion, but it is the flaw in it, or deficiency of something, is the cause of its erroneous motion. … Our motion is from God,—Acts 17:28, 'In him we move',—but not the disorder of that motion.

There is a fallacy of the accident in the minor proportion; for the actions of the wicked are sins, not (per se) in themselves, in as far as they are actions; but by an accident on account of the want of righteousness, and of the perversity of the will of the ungodly, who do not observe this so as to follow in the action the will of God.

As there is a vast difference between the sun being the cause of the lightsomeness and warmth of the atmosphere, and the brightness of gold and diamonds, by its presence and positive influence; and its being the occasion of darkness and frost, in the night, by its motion, whereby it descends below the horizon. The motion of the sun is the occasion of the latter kind of events; but it is not the proper cause, efficient, or producer of them; though they are necessarily consequent on that motion, under such circumstances: no more is any action of the Divine Being the cause of the evil of men's Wills.

He who uses as an instrument a man freely failing, to effect what is good, is not the author of the failure. … The wicked, while they sin, are not properly instruments of God moved, that is to say, without an internal principle of motion, but metaphorically, moved in such a way that they freely move themselves.

We thus see that there is no inconsistency in attributing the same act to God, to Satan, and to man, while, from the difference in the end and mode of action, the spotless righteousness of God shines forth at the same time that the iniquity of Satan and of man is manifested in all its deformity.

God acted nothing, but only ceased to act, and therefore could not be the efficient cause of man’s sin. As God is not the author of good but by willing and effecting it, so he is not the author of evil but by willing and effecting it. But he doth not positively will evil, nor effect it by any efficacy of his own. Permission is no action, nor the cause of that action which is permitted, but the will of that person who is permitted to do such an action is the cause.

The almighty power, unsearchable wisdom, and infinite goodness of God, so far manifest themselves in His providence, that His determinate counsel extends itself even to the first fall, and all other sinful actions both of angels and men (Rom. 11:32–34; 2 Sam. 24:1; 1 Chron. 21:1); and that not by a bare permission, which also He most wisely and powerfully bounds, and otherwise orders and governs (2 Kings 19:28; Ps. 76:10), in a manifold dispensation to His most holy ends (Gen. 50:20; Isa. 10:6–7, 12); yet so, as the sinfulness of their acts proceeds only from the creatures, and not from God, who, being most holy and righteous, neither is nor can be the author or approver of sin (Ps. 50:21; 1 John 2:16).

Yet we deny that He is the author of sin, or that the blame of things done amiss can be laid upon Him, seeing His will is the sovereign and infallible rule of all righteousness and equity: but this we confess that He has those admirable means as whereby He makes the devils and the ungodly, as His instruments to serve Him and to turn the evil which they do and whereof they are guilty into good.

As to the first, they deny that concupiscence or tinder is prohibited by the law of God because they do not consider it to be a sin. … But the orthodox think concupiscence is both properly sin and is prohibited by the law.

Now who can believe that Paul would so often and so expressly have called that sin, if it was not true sin and properly so called, but only because it flowed from sin and inclined to sin (as the Council falsely maintained)?

So far is it from being lawfully inferred from this that lust is not sin that by necessary consequence its sinfulness can thence be elicited. The effect ought to correspond with the cause; nor could lust bring forth actual sin unless it is itself sin.

He, then, who admits not that all the desires of the flesh are sins, and that that disease of concupiscence, which they call a stimulus, is a fountain of sin, must of necessity deny that the transgression of the law is sin.

We hold that all human desires are evil, and we charge them with sin not in as far as they are natural, but because they are inordinate, and inordinate because nothing pure and upright can proceed from a corrupt and polluted nature.

Those who maintain that concupiscence is not sin, are wont to found on the passage of James, "Then, when lust has conceived, it bringeth forth sin," (James 1:15). But this is easily refuted: for unless we understand him as speaking only of wicked works or actual sins, even a wicked inclination will not be accounted sin. But from his calling crimes and wicked deeds the fruits of lust, and also giving them the name of sins, it does not follow that the lust itself is not an evil, and in the sight of God deserving of condemnation.

The Reformed on the contrary state that all concupiscence, which certainly inclines toward evil, is sin, insofar as (1) all such concupiscence is against the law (Rom. 7:7) and thus is lawlessness, in which sin fully consists (1 John 3:4).

This very thing cannot be conceived, how something by way of an internal habit could be the cause of sin and not be sin. An internal cause inclining to act well is good.

The Apostle himself in Rom. 6 & 7 shows quite openly that concupiscence is sin properly so called: for not only does he often call it sin, but not good, evil, to be held in hatred, fighting against the law of God, to be crucified, mortified, and destroyed, and rendering that man miserable in whom it resides.

Moral corruption fighting against the law, for the crucifying and mortifying of which Christ himself died on the cross, if it be not properly sin, then Scripture has not explained to us what the property of any habitual sin is.

Whatever differs from the norm of the law is sin: but concupiscence in the regenerate differs from the norm of the law. Therefore.

Concupiscence, although it is without doubt born in us, is both an evil and sin; for we are not to judge according to nature, but according to the law whether a thing be sin or not. Whatever is opposed to the law is sin, whether it be born in us, or not.

Falsely, therefore, do the Papists remove it from the number of sins and reckon it among the works of God.

Nor does original sin cease to be sin because it was committed by us neither voluntarily nor knowingly; for it is enough that τὸ ἄνομον [to anomon, the lawless thing] is in our nature

Every spark of fire is fire, and will burn; so is every thing of the law of sin, the last, the least of it, -- it is enmity, it will poison, it will burn. … Mortification abates of its force, but doth not change its nature. Grace changeth the nature of man, but nothing can change the nature of sin. Whatever effect be wrought upon it, there is no effect wrought in it, but that it is enmity still, sin still.

Once more, it is named, "lust" or "concupiscence"; which is sin itself, and the mother of all sin

Bellarmine says that this inordinate concupiscence is not properly sin. What then? Shall we say it is improperly called sin, even though in the very principles of nature it chains and restrains man like a ferocious beast? Is this credible? Let Bellarmine believe such absurdities—we do not.

It is to be distinguished from natural concupiscence, that which God sowed in our nature, such as the concupiscence for food and drink, by which our bodies are nourished.—Evil concupiscence of itself is sin, even if the consent of the will be not added.

Since the precept about not coveting is general, it ought to be extended to all depraved and inordinate concupiscence, original and habitual as well as actual—whether this is determinate and voluntary or still indeterminate and only titillating. This is true in order that the perfect purity and holiness of the lawgiver may be noted (which will suffer not even the smallest taint of depraved concupiscence in man, but demands righteousness and holiness of every kind).

God therefore commands a strong and ardent affection, an affection not to be impeded by any portion, however minute, of concupiscence. He requires a mind so admirably arranged as not to be prompted in the slightest degree contrary to the law of love.

This corruption of nature is here forbidden, for it is truly and properly sin, Rom. 6:12 and 7:17. It is the flesh that lusteth against the Spirit, Gal. 5:18; and if sin, it must be contrary to and forbidden by the law.

Observe the holiness and perfection of God's law, which forbids the first motions and risings of sin in the heart. The laws of men take hold of actions; but the law of God goes further—it forbids not only sinful actions—but sinful desires.

On the contrary, as we think concupiscence is evil in its root and forbidden by the law, so also as to all the acts and motions springing from it, whether they follow or precede the formal consent of the will.

Such motions are not consistent with the holiness and purity which God demands from us and the required perfection of loving God with the whole heart and all the strength; therefore they cannot but be depraved and lawless (anomoi).

We again regard it as sin whenever man is influenced in any degree by any desire contrary to the law of God; nay, we maintain that the very pravity which begets in us such desires is sin.

The Reformed on the contrary state that all the acts of concupiscence, even the primary-first, are sins, because the contrary opinion is: (1) contrary to the express words of the apostle (Rom. 7:7); (2) contrary to the express demand of the law (Ex. 20:17); (3) contrary to the force and strictness of the law, which under the penalty of an eternal curse demands the most exact obedience (Matt. 22:37; Deut. 27:26; Gal. 3:10), and therefore condemns all concupiscence.

Accordingly, it is not valid to say: (1) it begets sin, therefore it is not sin. For a man, because he begets a man, does not cease to be a man; indeed, as we have said, it is sin by the very fact that it begets sin.

It is illicit, not only to give consent to evil, but also to have an inclination, or propensity to such consent: because all our powers ought to be carried toward the good.

We must here observe, that not only are corrupt and disordered inclinations sins, but the thinking of evil, in as far as it is connected with an inclination and propensity to pursue it, or with a desire to practice it, is sin.

The inmost thoughts of the heart, and the first motions of concupiscence therein, though not consented unto, much less actually accomplished in the outward deeds of sin, and all the occasions leading unto them, are directly forbidden in the law.

Fifth, the last commandment of lust forbids the first motions to sin that are before consent. … Again, the philosophers knew that lust with consent was evil, even by the light of nature. But Paul, a learned Pharisee, and therefore more than a philosopher, knew not lust to be sin that is forbidden in this commandment [Rom. 7:7]. Lust therefore that is forbidden here, is without consent.

First, therefore, we must resist suggestion, or thoughts: which are either ascending, from the tinder of concupiscence, or descending, suggested from elsewhere. The former are not without fault

Lust in the bud; that is, the first risings of lust, even before the consent of the will to them; the first openings of particular lusts, sometimes not regarded nor noticed, and so neither approved nor disapproved; and sometimes checked in their very rising, Rom. 7:15. But however it be, they are sins here forbidden, though the Papists will not allow them to be so

If that law demands perfect conformity to the image of God, then these impulses of evil are clearly sinful. … The Protestant doctrine which pronounces these impulsive acts to be of the nature of sin is confirmed by the consciousness of the believer. He recognizes as evil in their own nature the first risings of malice, envy, pride, or cupidity.

These, whatsoever the Papists say to the contrary, as soon as ever they do but begin to heave and stir in our breasts, are truly sins; and do, in their measure, pollute and defile the soul: for the soul of man is like a clear mirror, upon which if you only breathe, you sully it, and leave a dimness upon it

But Protestants also believe that lust or concupiscence in the regenerate, as including a remaining tendency towards what is sinful, and the first or earliest motions of this tendency in the heart, though not deliberately consented to and followed out, is itself truly and properly sinful.

Accordingly, we hold that there is always sin in the saints until they are freed from their mortal frame, because depraved concupiscence resides in their flesh, and is at variance with rectitude.

Sin, however, though it ceases to reign, ceases not to dwell in them. … We admit that these remains, just as if they had no existence, are not imputed, but we, at the same time, contend that it is owing to the mercy of God that the saints are not charged with the guilt which would otherwise make them sinners before God.

Now although by regeneration we hold that the guilt and pollution of original sin is taken away as to dominion (because it is neither imputed to them anymore for condemnation, nor does it reign in them), yet we deny that it is absolutely taken away as to existence and whatever holds the relation of sin in it.

It is one thing that there should be no condemnation in the renewed; another that they are worthy of condemnation and of hatred. The former Paul states in Rom. 8:1 because actual guilt is removed by the grace of justification, but not the latter.

That concupiscence does not condemn the regenerate, comes to pass by an accident, which is the grace of God, which does not impute it to the faithful. This, however, does not occur in this way, as though concupiscence were no sin; for other sins in like manner do not condemn the regenerate, not because they are no sins, but because they have obtained the pardon of them through Christ.

The commanding power of the law in positive precepts and prohibitions, which justified persons are subject unto, does make and constitute all their unconformities unto it to be no less truly and properly sins in their own nature, than they would be if their persons were obnoxious unto the curse of it.

Indeed it remains till death, and it is sin considered in itself, so long as it remains, but it is not imputed unto the person: and in that respect is as though it were not; it being pardoned.

That which lusts against the spirit, and by lusting tempts, and in tempting entices and draws the heart to sin, is for nature sin itself: but concupiscence in the regenerate lusts against the spirit, Gal. 5. 17. … And therefore it is sin properly: such as the fruit is, such is the tree.

We teach that the guilt of sin as to its legal being is entirely taken away, so that the obligation to punishment is removed, and the power obligating to condemnation; but sin remains as to its real being, and physical inherence.

This corruption of nature, during this life, doth remain in those that are regenerated (1 John 1:8, 10; Rom. 7:14, 17–18, 23; James 3:2; Prov. 20:9; Eccl. 7:20); and although it be, through Christ, pardoned and mortified; yet both itself, and all the motions thereof, are truly and properly sin (Rom. 7:5, 7–8, 25; Gal. 5:17).

The corruption of nature, during this life, does remain in those that are regenerated (Rom. 7:18, 23; Eccl. 7:20; 1 John 1:8); and although it be through Christ pardoned and mortified, yet both itself, and the first motions thereof, are truly and properly sin (Rom. 7:23–25; Gal. 5:17).

What does the tenth Commandment require? That not even the least inclination or thought against any commandment of God ever enter our heart, but that with our whole heart we continually hate all sin and take pleasure in all righteousness (Rom. 7:7–8).

Q. 86. What is forbidden in the tenth commandment? A. The tenth commandment forbids all discontentment with our own estate (1 Kings 21:4; Est. 5:13; 1 Cor. 10:10), envying or grieving at the good of our neighbor (Gal. 5:26; James 3:14, 16), and all inordinate motions and affections to anything that is his (Rom. 7:7–8; 13:9; Deut. 5:21).

We believe that through the disobedience of Adam original sin is extended to all mankind; which is a corruption of the whole nature and a hereditary disease, … and which produces in man all sorts of sin, being in him as a root thereof, and, therefore, is so vile and abominable in the sight of God that it is sufficient to condemn all mankind. … Not that they should rest securely in sin, but that a sense of this corruption should make believers often to sigh, desiring to be delivered from this body of death.

Hence we see how widely the Papists differ from her, who idly adorn her with their empty devices, and reckon almost as nothing the benefits which she received from God. They heap up an abundance of magnificent and very presumptuous titles, such as, "Queen of Heaven, Star of Salvation, Gate of Life, Sweetness, Hope, and Salvation." Nay more, to such a pitch of insolence and fury have they been hurried by Satan, that they give her authority over Christ; for this is their pretty song, "Beseech the Father, Order the Son." None of these modes of expression, it is evident, proceeded from the Lord. All are disclaimed by the holy virgin in a single word, when she makes her whole glory to consist in acts of the divine kindness. If it was her duty to praise the name of God alone, who had done to her wonderful things, no room is left for the pretended titles, which come from another quarter.

And, as our natural corruption was produced originally in the first Adam, and propagated from him to us, so our new nature and holiness is first produced in Christ, and derived from Him to us, or as it were propagated. So that we are not at all to work together with Christ, in making or producing that holy frame in us, but only to take it to ourselves, and use it in our holy practice, as made ready to our hands.