Perrydox.com is devoted to the pursuit of truth, whether plain or paradoxical, whether simple or sublime, or simply absurd yet absolute.
Romans 5:12 – What Question Is Being Asked
Before we can properly get out of a text what the writer put in the text we must discover, “What question is being asked?” To find an answer to a question that is not being asked is an improper use of that text. For example, in Romans 5:12 is Paul asking “why do all men sin” or “why do all men die?” To find the doctrine of original sin in Romans 5:12 is to make Paul say something he did not intend. He is not discussing why people sin, but rather why people die – because all sin.
I find the question “why do all men sin?” rather intriguing. We want to blame Adam, but I suggest that we sin for the same reason Adam did. We want to. Apparently we do not need some inherited sin in order to sin. After all, Adam was created perfectly, and he sinned.
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