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this does not make God the author of sin, since man wrongly conceives of this imperfection as
sin. Sin has no objective existence, but exists only in man’s consciousness. But this theory
makes man constitutionally evil. The evil was present in man even in his original state, when
the God-consciousness was not sufficiently strong to control the sensuous nature of man. It is in
flagrant opposition to Scripture, when it holds that man wrongly adjudges this evil to be sin,
and thus makes sin and guilt purely subjective. And though Schleiermacher wishes to avoid this
conclusion, it does make God the responsible author of sin, for He is the creator of man’s
sensuous nature. It also rests upon an incomplete induction of facts, since it fails to take
account of the fact that many of the most hateful sins of man do not pertain to his physical but
to his spiritual nature, such as avarice, envy, pride, malice, and others. Moreover, it leads to the
most absurd conclusions as, for instance, that asceticism, by weakening the sensuous nature,
necessarily weakens the power of sin; that man becomes less sinful as his senses fail with age;
that death is the only redeemer; and that disembodied spirits, including the devil himself, have
no sin.
5. THE THEORY OF SIN AS WANT OF TRUST IN GOD AND OPPOSITION TO HIS KINGDOM, DUE
TO IGNORANCE.
Like Schleiermacher, Ritschl too stresses the fact that sin is understood only
from the standpoint of the Christian consciousness. They who are outside of the pale of the
Christian religion, and they who are still strangers to the experience of redemption, have no
knowledge of it. Under the influence of the redemptive work of God man becomes conscious of
his lack of trust in God and of his opposition to the Kingdom of God, which is the highest good.
Sin is not determined by man’s attitude to the law of God, but by his relation to the purpose of
God, to establish the Kingdom. Man imputes his failure to make the purpose of God his own to
himself as guilt, but God regards it merely as ignorance, and because it is ignorance, it is
pardonable. This view of Ritschl reminds us by way of contrast of the Greek dictum that
knowledge is virtue. It fails completely to do justice to the Scriptural position that sin is above
all transgression of the law of God, and therefore renders man guilty in the sight of God and
worthy of condemnation. Moreover, the idea that sin is ignorance goes contrary to the voice of
Christian experience. The man who is burdened with the sense of sin certainly does not feel
that way about it. He is grateful, too, that not only the sins which he committed in ignorance
are pardonable, but all the others as well, with the single exception of the blasphemy against
the Holy Spirit.
6. THE THEORY THAT SIN IS SELFISHNESS.
This position is taken among others by Mueller and
A. H. Strong. Some who take this position conceive of selfishness merely as the opposite of
altruism or benevolence; others understand by it the choice of self rather than God as the
supreme object of love. Now this theory, especially when it conceives of selfishness as a putting
of self in the place of God, is by far the best of the theories named. Yet it can hardly be called