What is Original Sin?

A phrase often used and thrown around: original sin. For many, the doctrine of original sin is understood as a mark or stain on our souls that need to be washed and cleaned at Baptism. For others, original sin is some unfair punishment we all suffer through no fault of our own.

So, what is original sin? To understand this biblical and theological reality, we must go back to the beginning.

In the beginning, God created man and woman out of love, in order that they might share in His love. The book of Genesis relates that the first man and woman, Adam and Eve, through disobedience of God, fall out of harmony with God and “lose the grace of original holiness” (CCC 399).

All the descendants of Adam and Eve are then implicated in this sin and loss, and thus do not live with the original holiness and the many gifts that Adam and Eve once held. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that “the transmission of original sin is a mystery that we cannot fully understand” (CCC 404).

There is, however, much light that can be shed upon the question of how, and why, original sin is inherited by the human race, and what the effect of this reality is. Drawing particularly on the writings of the early patristic, St. Irenaeus of Lyons, and Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI), we see that the key to unlocking the mystery of original sin lies in the relationality of human beings.

What Isn’t Original Sin?

It must first be pointed out that the term ‘original sin’ is, as Ratzinger says, “misleading and imprecise” (Ratzinger 72). The Catechism of the Catholic Church clarifies, “original sin is called ‘sin’ only in an analogical sense: it is a sin ‘contracted’ and not ‘committed’ – a state and not an act” (CCC 404).

Of course, the original sin of Adam and Eve is an actual committed sin – the sin of disobedience and pride. However, when we speak of original sin in regard to the rest of humanity, it is a sin “contracted” and not “committed”. Adam and Eve committed the original sin and so we inherit its consequences.

This distinction is important because to truly understand how original sin is inherited, it must be clear that what is transmitted to the human race through Adam and Eve is not an actual sin or personal sin, but rather, a lack of grace.

The human race has “contracted” original sin insofar as all human beings are born out of the original harmony that Adam and Eve once had with God. To be as precise and concise as possible – human beings are not born with a sin, they are born without God’s grace.

Born into Bondage

St. Irenaeus provides an excellent image of humanity born into a fallen nature; he gives the illustration of slavery. For Irenaeus, Adam and Eve fall into slavery with their sin, and all their descendants were “begotten in the same captivity” (Irenaeus III.23.2). In the temporal sense, slaves cannot give birth to free persons, the same is true in the spiritual sense – Adam and Eve, who are enslaved to sin, give birth to children who are likewise enslaved.

Irenaeus also comments on the scriptural point that man is made in the image and likeness of God (Gen 1:26); he writes, regarding humanity’s procession from Adam, “we are all from him: and as we are from him, therefore have we all inherited his title” (Irenaeus III.23.2). This inheritance refers both to humanity’s creation in the image and likeness of God as well as humanity’s share in Adam’s fall from grace. Thus, humanity shares in the goodness of being created by God, but also in the depravity of being alienated from God through a fallen nature.

Joseph Ratzinger understands this in a similar way when he says, “At the very moment that a person begins human existence, which is a good, he or she is confronted by a sin-damaged world” (Ratzinger 73).

A Relational Understanding

Ratzinger is clear that today’s understanding of sin and guilt in a very individual and personal manner makes it difficult, and even offensive, to confront the doctrine of original sin. This difficulty is overcome by understanding the human person as being and existing always in relationship with others: “Human beings are relational, and they possess their lives –themselves– only by way of relationship. But sin means the damaging or the destruction of relationality” (72-73).

The relationship of human beings had been injured by sin – most specifically the first sin of Adam and Eve – and human nature has suffered because of this sin. The implication of humanity in the sin of Adam is thus not the imputation of personal guilt on each human being for a sin they did not commit, rather, it is the state of fallen nature, broken relationality, and enslavement that each human being is born into.

We Cannot Save Ourselves

This more accurate understanding of original sin results in a better understanding of God as the liberator of the enslaved human race. Seeing humanity as fallen together in damaged relationality, Ratzinger points out “that human beings alone cannot save themselves” (Ratzinger 73). To use Irenaeus’ illustration, the slaves cannot free themselves but must be set free by somebody else, “somebody, compassionate towards those who had been made slaves” (Irenaeus III.23.2). The human race finds itself together in bondage and in need of a liberator.

The common, wrongheaded conception of original sin as God punishing humans for another’s sins, or as Ratzinger describes it, as God running a “concentration camp, in which one’s relatives are imprisoned,” is turned completely upside-down with a proper understanding of original sin (Ratzinger, 72).

Satan “had led man captive,” St. Irenaeus writes, and it is God who has loosened man “from the bonds of condemnation” (Irenaeus III.23.1). A proper understanding of the doctrine of original sin explains the necessity of salvation being the work of God, for man is completely unable to save himself – to restore himself to a nature that has been lost.

Joseph Ratzinger concludes, “We can be saved only when he from whom we have cut ourselves off takes the initiative with us and stretches out his hand to us” (Ratzinger 74). God is the liberator who alone can set the captives free and restore them to the original holiness they were created to enjoy with Him.

The doctrine of original sin is indeed shrouded in mystery, but it is not beyond comprehension. The writings of St. Irenaeus and Joseph Ratzinger help elucidate the Church’s understanding of how and why original sin is transmitted to the entire human race.

First, it is clear that human beings do not possess original sin as a personal fault, rather, human beings lack the grace of original holiness that Adam and Eve first lived in. Through disobedience, Adam and Eve lost the grace of God and lived with a fallen nature; they lived in captivity to sin, and thus could not pass on the freedom of grace to their descendants, rather, all humanity is likewise born into captivity.

The relationality of all human beings is what truly explains how and why humanity lives in a fallen nature – from the beginning mankind’s relationships were damaged, and only became more strained thereafter.

The consequence of this truth is that human beings cannot save themselves, they cannot restore their own nature, only God can. God alone can step forward and restore human beings, God alone can offer grace – His life – to a fallen humanity. God alone can destroy the captor and set the captives free – and God did so, through Jesus Christ.