Chapter III: The Things that Followed the Fall of Our First Parents.
CHAPTER III: OF THOSE THINGS WHICH FOLLOWED THE FALL
OF OUR FIRST PARENTS
§ 42. An immense Iliad1 of ills followed the fall of our first parents. Gen. 3:7: “Their eyes were opened and they saw that they were naked. They sewed together fig leaves and made themselves aprons.” The opening of their eyes is both the perception of sin and the pricking of conscience. Therefore, at that time, they finally knew how seriously they had offended God, the great happiness out of which they had been cast, and the great pit of miseries in which they had been immersed through sin. Augustine (De Gen. ad lit., bk. 11, ch. 1): “Before the fall, they thought they had nothing to conceal because they felt nothing which had to be restrained.” But after the fall, they saw that they were naked, and they noticed that they had been stripped of the righteousness and integrity with which they had been created, that their flesh was being aroused by the incitements of their lusts, and that the law of their members was opposing the law of their mind [Rom. 7:23]. Augustine (De civ. Dei, bk. 14, ch. 17): Before the fall, “they were naked and unashamed—not because their nakedness had been unknown to them; rather, their nakedness was not yet shameful because lust was not yet moving their members outside their will, and their flesh, in its disobedience, was not yet providing any testimony to censure the disobedience of man.”
§ 43. Just how great a darkness took the place of the lost wisdom can be seen in the fact that they sew aprons of fig leaves and think that they can deceive the clear eyes of God, even though the eyes of divine Majesty penetrate all things, probe the heart and emotions, and have exposed the hidden recesses of our hearts to the light of their view [cf. 1 Kings 8:39; Heb. 4:12–13]. Augustine (De Gen. ad lit., ch. 34): “They wanted to hide from Him from whom nothing can hide, and to conceal the flesh from Him who looks into the heart.” Terror, trembling, and trepidation are connected with the blindness which followed sin, for they flee from the sight of God whom they had addressed very familiarly beforehand. They were agitated before Him to whom they had listened with very great joy beforehand. When the leaves were stirred by the wind, they were terrified by the slightest breath, though before they had lived in very great peace and tranquility of mind.
§ 44. But they also stand at the judgment seat of divine justice, and their case is examined. It must be observed here that the excusing away of sin and the transference of blame to another are added to the very tragic blindness in their mind, their turning away and flight from God in their will, and the [lustful] rebellion of their members. Adam transfers the blame to Eve, as if the woman was given so that she would not so much obey her husband as have him be obedient [Gen. 3:12]. Eve transfers it to the serpent, as if she had not been equipped with enough strength to resist the deception [Gen. 3:13]. Yet the blame is actually being transferred to God Himself, who had created the serpent and Eve, and who had given her to man as a helper.
The punishment of our first parents.
§ 45. Bellarmine (De amiss. grat. et stat. peccat., bk. 3, ch. 11) discusses the punishment of the first sin and errs by thinking that in Genesis 2 “no mention is made by God of the proper and fitting punishment which man incurs through sin, namely, that original righteousness was lost through the first sin.” And yet when God calls Adam and asks him, v. 9: “Where are you?” and when He asks him, v. 11: “Who told you that you were naked?” He is setting the misery which he incurs by the loss of original righteousness before the eyes of man quite clearly. Augustine (De Gen. ad lit., bk. 11, ch. 34): “For this was not the voice of one who was ignorant, but of one who was rebuking.”
According to the interpretation of Chrysostom on this passage: “This was also the voice of one who had compassion.” How does it happen that you flee My sight, that you shudder when you hear My voice, though before you would run to Me quickly and happily? Why do you blush over your nudity? Do you not know that the corruption of nature sprang from sin? Surely all this was directed to the purpose that man should be led to the knowledge of his sin and of the wretchedness introduced by sin. These things that are announced to the first parents as punishment are, properly speaking, paternal chastisements imposed upon them after God had accepted them into grace through the Gospel promise about the woman’s Seed, which would bruise the serpent’s head [Gen. 3:15]. To Eve it was announced that a lustful conception, a laborious gestation, and the many pains of giving birth would follow, and that she would be forced to be subject to her husband [Gen. 3:16]. To the man was announced a barrenness of good fruits, fertility of harmful fruits, the difficulty of gaining provisions, the concern of labor, and, finally, the bitterness of death [Gen. 3:17–19]. These calamities were imposed upon our first parents after they had received the remission of their sin, that those difficulties might be a permanent reminder of the gravity of the fall, a salutary protection against sins, and, finally, a schoolhouse of repentance, hope, patience, and other virtues.
The punishment of the serpent.
§ 46. Bellarmine (loc. cit.) explains the punishment inflicted upon the serpent in this way. He first recounts the entire statement to the natural serpent, and then later applies the same entire statement to the devil. In this section he departs from the genuine and legitimate explanation of the text, the first part of which does indeed pertain to the natural serpent (and not to the devil), when God says, [Gen. 3:]14: “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all animals and beasts of the earth. You shall go upon your belly, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life.” The latter part of the threat properly concerns Satan (not the natural serpent), when God says, v. 15: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He will crush your head, and you will attack His heel.” Since it was not a mere serpent, but Satan filling a serpent, who deceived the first parents, what could be in greater harmony with the text than if this divine threat were referred to the natural serpent in its first part and to the infernal serpent in its latter part?
It should not seem strange to anyone that this punishment is inflicted on the serpent, which is nevertheless an animal without reason, for God wanted to establish the ugliness of sin and the magnitude of His wrath before the eyes of the first parents and to publish a public sign of guilt, because this was in His power as the Creator of all things and as one having authentic sovereignty over all things He had created. A threefold punishment is imposed: the first of these concerns the manner of life, that is, the way of life; the second, the form, that is, the shape of the body; third, how one lives, that is, sustenance. Bellarmine does violence to the text in applying these to Satan:
The devil is cursed above all animals and beasts of the earth because he became wretched and vile above all sinners, whether angels or men. The devil moves upon his belly, both because he trusts in his own cleverness and because he is permitted by God to rejoice in his pride and false power. The devil eats earth, either because he devours men of the earth or because he exercises earthly power over the bodies of the saints but cannot kill their souls. This he does all the days of his life, that is, until Judgment Day.
All these things are forced and alien to the text. Certainly some of the fathers also take pleasure in these allegories, but they still admit that this part of the threat must be taken to refer properly and in a literal sense to the natural serpent. The latter part pertains only to the devil, against whom war would be waged at some time by the Seed of the woman and to whom the bruising of his head—that is, the destruction of his power and kingdom—is announced. We do not allow this evangelical promise to be corrupted by Bellarmine, Calvin, the Photinians, and the rabbis in such a way that it applies in the literal sense to the natural serpent. More was said above concerning this matter [§§ 8–9].
The evangelical promise given to our first parents.
§ 47. They would have had to perish in eternal death by the power of the divine condemnation had not God, out of the secret counsel of His majesty and the deep reservoir of His mercy, published the evangelical promise about the woman’s Seed who would bruise the head of the serpent [Gen. 3:15]. The woman’s Seed is Christ, the Son of God, who was born of a virgin, who “came to destroy in turn the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Redemption from sin, death, and hell is included in this statement. For if the head of the serpent has to be bruised, it is surely necessary for death to be abolished. If death is abolished, the merit of death—that is, sin—is also abolished. If sin is abolished, then the curse of the Law is also abolished, and not only that, but at the same time the obedience that was lost is restored and a hope of eternal life is revealed, as Dr. Luther so beautifully observes here.2 At the same time, it is also revealed that the redemption and bruising of the serpent’s body are going to happen in such a way that the heel of Christ is bruised, that is, that His life is going to be taken away, that He is going to be nailed to the cross, and that the very limbs of Christ are going to be subjected to the cross in this life.
§ 48. Our first parents embraced this promise of the Gospel about the Messiah with true faith and became partakers of salvation, from which they had been cut off by sin. From this, Adam calls his wife “Eve”—that is, “the living one” [Gen. 3:20]—and by this naming he confesses his own faith, namely, that he believes that from Eve the Prince of Life would be born, who would abolish the death that had been introduced into the world through sin and who would restore life to humanity. From this, Eve exclaimed when Cain was born: “I have gotten a man—the Lord” [Gen. 4:1], because she believed that she had given birth to the true Jehovah who would bruise the serpent’s head.
The sacrifices of Cain and Abel also apply here, a mode of divine worship which God had undoubtedly revealed to them through Adam. And here also apply those words about the removal or remission of sin to be sought in the promised Seed. (See Gen. 4:7.) Irenaeus (bk. 3, ch. 34):
It is very unreasonable that he who had been harmed seriously by his foe, and first suffered captivity, should say that he was not saved by him who overcame his foe but that his children whom he begot during his captivity were saved, though the foe remained unconquered still, while his ancient spoils remained with him.
Chapter 35:
God did not curse Adam himself, but the earth in his works, because God did indeed transfer the curse onto the earth so that it might not continue to exist in man.
Chapter 36:
All of those are liars who speak against his
(Adam’s)
salvation. They are always thus cutting themselves off from life because they do not believe that the sheep which had been lost was found. But if that one is not found, then every generation of humanity is still held in perdition. Therefore Tatian, who introduced this opinion—no, this ignorance and blindness—is a liar.
The sin of Adam affects us too.
§ 49. To be sure, we must not look upon the sin of our first parents and those sins which followed it as if they applied only to those people but affected us not at all, for “Adam later begot a son after his own image and likeness” (Gen. 5:3). He began to beget the sort of children he himself was: stripped of the image of God; destitute of original righteousness; subject to sin, the wrath of God, death, and damnation. Adam was, and we all were in him; Adam perished, and we all perished in him.
§ 50. When parents lose possession of their estate, their male children also lose it because parents receive it not only for themselves but also for their sons. So also our first parents, who were created in the image of God, received those gifts given to them by the kindness of God to be guarded faithfully for themselves and their descendants like a deposit, and, therefore, by sinning they also lost them not only for themselves but also for the whole lineage born of them.
§ 51. All of nature was corrupted and soured, so to speak, by sin through defeated mankind. Anselm (Cur Deus homo, bk. 1, ch. 23): “The entire human nature was in them, and outside of them there was nothing of it. Thus the entire thing was spoiled, weakened, corrupted. There remained in it a debt for the righteousness it had received, the debt of satisfaction which had severed it, along with the corruption which it had incurred through sin.”
Anselm (De conc. virg., ch. 2): “Therefore just as sprouts and fruits are produced spoiled and corrupt from a corrupt root, just as dirty streams gush from a polluted spring, just as leprous children are produced from leprous parents, so also from the first parents, who had been corrupted and depraved by sin, all the descendants are born corrupt and polluted by sin.”
§ 52. Therefore the sin is in every way not foreign to us because Adam sinned not as a private person but as the head of the whole human race. As the human nature communicated through him became the property of each person begotten of him, so also the corruption of the nature is communicated through propagation. Consequently, just as the tribe of Levi, enclosed within the loins of Abraham,3 is said to have offered tithes to Melchizedek (Heb. 7:9), so also we who were concealed within the loins of sinful Adam not only have been corrupted in and with him but also have become guilty of the wrath of God. (For the sake of comparison, the following can be quoted in reference to this: [Corpus Iuris Civilis,] bk. 5, C. ad l. Jul. majest.: “Children also must be punished for the crime of lèse-majesté.”)
§ 53. Therefore as Adam lost the light of the wisdom of God after the fall, so also we are born destitute of the light of divine knowledge. As Adam fled the sight of God, so also we are born destitute of filial trust in God. As Adam belittled and excused his sin, so also we have become so extremely corrupt that we do not sufficiently acknowledge or deplore this extreme corruption. As Adam, through the fall, incurred the offense of God, was called to the judgment of God, and became subject to eternal death, so also we “are by nature the children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3).
§ 54. The Pelagians, who think that our paying the penalty of someone else’s sin would appear foreign to the mercy and righteousness of God, should be given this response: yet original sin is not an evil belonging to someone else, nor are we born innocent, but the corruption of sin is propagated into us through carnal generation and dwells within us like a leprosy. Augustine (Contr. Julian., bk. 6, ch. 4):
You say that someone ought not be held liable for the sin of another, which is an important point insofar as it is understood correctly. Now, I am not saying that David sinned and that because of his sin so many thousands fell (2 Samuel 24), and that because one man transgressed contrary to the command, revenge proceeded from the curse against those who had not committed [the crime] nor even knew it had been done. The argument concerning this sort of sin or punishment is another matter, and it should not now trouble us. But the sins of parents are said in some way to be someone else’s, and again in some way are found to be ours too. To be sure, they are someone else’s by the property of action, but they are ours by the contagion of propagation.
Augustine (De civ. Dei, bk. 13, ch. 14):
Man, who was self-corrupted and justly condemned, produced corrupted and condemned children, for we were all in that one man when that one man corrupted us all. The particular form in which we were to live as individuals had not yet been individually created and distributed, but already the seminal nature existed from which we were to be propagated—namely, the nature which was corrupted because of sin, bound by the chain of death, and justly condemned—nor could man be born of man under any other condition. Thus through this man, from the evil use of his free choice, there arose a continuous line of calamity which draws the human race from its corrupt origin as from a rotten root, all the way to the ruin that is the second death, which has no end. The only exceptions are those who are freed through the grace of God.
The arrangement of the points which follow.
§ 55. That is the sin which is called original sin. We shall discuss it under the following headings: (1) Whether it exists. (2) What it is, both in name and in its essence. (3) What its subject is. (4) How it is propagated to descendants. (5) What its proper punishment is. (6) How, in turn, we are freed from it. In these divisions, the entire nature of this original corruption can be suitably explained.
1 Homer’s Iliad is noteworthy for being very lengthy.
2 Cf. Lectures on Genesis (1535–45/1544–54), AE 1:182–98 (WA 42:136–47).
3 Read Abrahae with Cotta instead of Adae.