Adam, the Fall, and Original Sin: Theological, Biblical, and Scientific Perspectives Paperback – November 4, 2014

This is a collection of essays that supports the claim that a historical Adam and original sin are essential, irremovable, relevant, and credible elements of the Christian faith. The basic thesis of the editors and the essay authors is that “the traditional doctrine of original sin is not only orthodox but also the most theologically cogent synthesis of the biblical witness.”The book discusses three key areas of the debate: the epistemological status of natural science for theology, historical criticism of the Bible, and church tradition.Like all collections of essays, some are more interesting than others. I will briefly mention the five that I found most interesting.The first was “Adam and Eve in the Old Testament,” in which C. John Collins mentions specific points of disagreement with Peter Enns, Daniel Harlow, and James Barr. The footnotes are almost as interesting as the text. In them, Collins explains how his views are different from the views of Enns, Harlow, and Barr.Carl Truman’s “Original Sin and Modern Theology” surveys six modern theologians on the other side of the argument (Friedrich Schleiermacher, Walter Rauschenbusch, Karl Barth, Rudolf Bultmann, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Wolfhart Pannenberg), all of whom “repudiate any notion that humanity stands guilty before God because of the imputation of an alien guilt, the guilt of a historical man called Adam, to all of his descendants,” leading to the rejection of a movement from innocence to guilt and condemnation in history. Thus “Adam functions as the great example of the way in which we all sin, we all fall” for these theologians.James M. Hamilton’s aim in his essay “Original Sin in Biblical Theology” is to “trace out how original sin factors into the interpretive perspective of the biblical authors,” contending that Paul is not the only biblical author who interprets Genesis 3 to indicate that Adam’s sin has made all his descendants moral cripples.” Hamilton proceeds to nitpick Peter Enns’ book “The Evolution of Adam, accusing Enns of trying to accommodate the Bible to biological evolution while Hamilton himself tries to accommodate the Bible to the doctrine of original sin.In their essay “Original Sin and Systematic Theology,” the two editors propose that “rejecting a historical Adam and original sin would leave us without a recognizably Christian gospel.” They look at five key areas of doctrine that are affected by belief in (or denial of) originated sin: the doctrines of humanity, sin, salvation, Christ, and God, and conclude that “a denial of Adam’s original sin, inherited by us all, strikes at the very heart of the Christian faith.”Hans Maduene’ essay “Original Sin and Modern Science” is an excellent summary of the various views on original sin, who holds them, and the issues around each view. He suggests that “the threshold for abandoning, or significantly revising, the doctrine of the fall is very high.The book also contains surveys of Adam in the New Testament, Adam and Modern Science, Original Sin in Patristic Theology, the Lutheran Doctrine of Original Sin, Original Sin in Reformed Theology, the Doctrine of Original Sin in Wesleyan Theology, Original Sin in Pastoral Theology, Original Sin and Original Death, The Fall and Genesis 3, and William Edgar’s “Adam, History, and Theodicy,” in which he argues that there must have been an original couple in order to have a sound view of the problem of evil and its resolution.I particularly recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in this topic and/or who already read Enns’s book, “The Evolution of Adam,” Daniel Harlow’s essays, Denis Lamoureux’s book “Evolutionary Creation,” and/or others who have made their case that a historical Adam and fall are not necessary for Christian faith. It’s a good summary of the case for a historical Adam and a historical fall.

thanks

I'm glad to see that someone is beginning to address the lack of a coherent continuity of the doctrine of Original Sin (referred to as Ancestral Sin within Orthodoxy) in the community of local churches that go by the name of "Protestant". I was a practicing Protestant for almost 30 years before entering the Catholic church in 2007. But I still cherish all the good things I learned as a Protestant, including a healthy grasp of the pervasiveness of sin in both the world and it's human stewards.This book offers a modest overview of the different perspectives on the doctrine, and some insight into the origins of the doctrine, but lacks anything substantive to say about what to do next. This is one of the problems of Protestantism itself; there is certainly no lack of leaders within the Protestant community, but it appears there is no means of reconciling disputes among the leadership when they occur (i.e. there is no leadership among the leaders). So the book, very much worth the money and time to read for information purposes, doesn't really resolve anything.I gave it 4 stars simply to encourage more individuals within the Protestant community to purchase and read it for doctrinal purposes, and to see just how much basic theology within Protestantism has been jettisoned since the Reformation. Personally, I still read and follow the early Reformers (I still consider myself to be a Wesleyan even though I am Catholic). Unfortunately, as a result of the outright laziness and condescension of most of the late 20th century Protestant clergy, even the most fundamental dogmas of the Christian faith have been either blatantly obscured or outright denied.Bottom Line: Read the book. It is certainly worth the money.

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Excellent read!