On the Virginal Conception, and On Original Sin: Chapter 23
BASIC WRITINGS
and above the sin of Adam—though when I consider this latter alternative, I cannot make sense of it. In Cur Deus Homo I laid out my views on the gravity of this sin and its recompense, as you have already read. Nevertheless, it is true that no one is restored to the state for which human beings were created and a reproductive nature was given to them, and no one is rescued from the evils into which human nature has fallen, except through recompense for that sin by which human nature threw itself into those evils.
Someone might say, "If these individuals do not have Adam's sin, how can you claim that none of them is saved except through recompense for Adam's sin? How does a just God demand from them recompense for a sin that is not theirs?" But in fact God does not demand from any sinner more than he owes; yet since no sinner can pay back as much as he owes, Christ alone, on behalf of all who are saved, pays back more than they owe, as I have already explained in that oft-cited work.
Still, we need to examine yet another explanation for the fact that sin is less in infants than it was in Adam, even though it passes to all of them from him.
For "through one human being"—that is, through Adam—"sin entered into this world, and through sin, death."42
Chapter 23 Why and how it passes to infants Yet one will not understand why it is less in them unless one understands why and how it is present in them in the first place.Although I just explained this above, to the extent that it was needed in order to answer my question, it will not be pointless to repeat it here briefly. Certainly it cannot be denied that infants were in Adam when he sinned. But they were in him causally, or materially, as in his seed; they are in themselves personally. For in him they were the seed itself, whereas in themselves each of them is individually a distinct person.In him they were not distinct from him,but in themselves they are distinct from him. In him they were Adam; in themselves they are themselves.
Therefore, they were in him, but they were not themselves, since they did not yet exist.
Perhaps someone will say,"When you say that other human beings 'were' in Adam, this 'being' is like nothing. It's inconsequential. It should not even be called 'being'."Well, then, let him say that the being by which Christ was in Abraham according to his seed, and in David, and in the other fathers, was nothing or empty or false. Let him say this of the being by which all things that are from seed were in their seeds. Let him say that God made nothing
42 Romans 5:12.
ON THE VIRGINAL CONCEPTION, AND ON ORIGINAL SIN
when he first made in their seeds all the things that are reproduced from seed.
If truly this did not exist, the things we see existing would not exist; let him then say that this is nothing, that it is something empty. For if it is not true that the things nature reproduces from seeds first exist in those seeds, those things would not in any way be from those seeds. Now it is the height of foolishness to say these things, and so the being by which all other human beings were in Adam was not false or empty but true and solid; and when God made them to be in Adam, what he made was not something inconsequential. Nonetheless, as I have said, in Adam they were not distinct from Adam, and therefore they existed in quite a different way from how they exist in themselves.
Now although it is incontestable that they all existed in Adam, only the Virgin's son was in Adam in a very different way from the others.All the others were in Adam in such a way that they would be from him by means of the reproductive nature that had been subjected to his power and will, whereas
Christ alone was not in Adam in such a way that he would come to be from Adam by means of his nature or will. For in the case of all the others, it had been given to Adam at the time of his sin to be both the one from whom they were to come and the one from whom they would exist; but in the case of Christ it had been given to Adam to be the one from whom he was to come but not to be the one from whom he would exist—for it was not in Adam's power that Christ should be propagated from him.Nor was it in Adam's power that he should come to exist from some other being, or from nothing. It was not, therefore, up to Adam that Christ should exist in any way, since it was not in the power of Adam's nature or of his will that Christ should exist in any way. Nonetheless, there was in Adam the nature from which Christ would be propagated—though by God's power,not Adam's.For although will had sown the seed and nature had given it growth in our ancestors up to the Virgin
Mother, so that the Virgin herself was brought into being from Adam by an order partly natural and partly voluntary, just as everyone else was, in her no creaturely will sowed her offspring, and no nature gave it growth. Rather,"the Holy Spirit" and "the power of the Most High"43 miraculously propagated a man from a virgin woman. Therefore, in the case of all others, it was in Adam—that is,in his power—that they should exist from him;but in the case of Christ, it was not in Adam that he should exist in any way, just as it was not in the dust from which the first man was made that he should exist miraculously from the dust, and just as it was not in the man that Eve should exist from him in the way in which she was made.But neither was it in any of those from Adam to Mary in whom he existed that he should exist.And yet he did exist in them, because that from which he was going to be assumed existed in 43 Luke 1:35.
BASIC WRITINGS
them—in the same way that Adam existed in the dust from which the first human being was made, and Eve existed in the man from whom she was made: not by any creature's will or power, but by divine power alone.Yet his coming into being sprang from a greater and more miraculous grace, since they were mere human beings, but he was the God-man. And so he was in Adam at the time of Adam's sin in a very different way from those who were procreated according to the voluntary and natural order. Therefore, in a certain way Adam makes those who are procreated when human will sows the seed and nature gives them growth, through the power that will and nature have received; but it is God alone who made this man, even though he is from Adam, because he did not come to be through Adam but through himself, as though from himself.
What, therefore, would be more fitting for displaying the great goodness of God and the fullness of the grace that he granted to Adam, than that those whose being was in Adam's power, so that through him they would be what he was naturally, should likewise be under the sway of his free choice, so that he would propagate them to be such as he was himself in his justice and happiness? Therefore, this was granted to him.Yet although he had been placed on such a pinnacle of grace, he spontaneously abandoned the goods that he had received for the purpose of preserving them both for himself and for them; and for that reason his children lost what their father took away from them by not preserving it, although he could have given it to them simply by preserving it himself. This seems to me to be a sufficient reason—provided that we pay heed to pure justice itself, leaving aside our own wills, which so often seriously hinder the mind from understanding rectitude—why the sin and evils of Adam pass to infants. But I shall say a few words about how, in my view, that sin passes to them.
As I have said, there is sin from the nature and sin from the person. That which is from the person can be called 'personal', whereas that which is from the nature can be called 'natural' but is usually called 'original'.And just as personal sin is transmitted to the nature, so too natural sin is transmitted to the person, in the following way.Adam's nature required him to eat; it was created to require this. But his eating from the forbidden tree came not from his natural will but from his personal will—that is, from his own will.Yet what the person did, he did not do without the nature. For the person was what was called 'Adam'; the nature was what was called 'human being'. Therefore, the person made the nature sinful, since when Adam sinned, human being sinned.
It was not because he was a human being that he was driven to the presumption of eating the forbidden fruit; rather, he was drawn to it by his own will— a will that the nature did not require, but to which the person gave birth.
What takes place in infants is like this, only in the other direction. Indeed, what caused them to lack the justice they ought to have was not their