Sav on Saturday

I just finished reading a book by Elaine Pagels called “Adam, Eve, and the Serpent.” It's a highly engaging historical analysis of how the early Christians developed their views on sexuality, the creation story, the fall of man, and original sin.

Although I found the entire book to be enlightening about the fact that there has never been one “true” Christianity, a few points especially intrigued me.

For example, Augustine was the one to introduce, ie create, the idea of original sin. It had not been present in the Christian vocabulary before then. Augustine interpreted the fall of Adam as the fall of humanity. He saw death as unnatural, a punishment for Adam and Eve's sin. All of humanity is tainted by this moral decay in that sickness, hardship, and misery exist. No one is born innocent, for as Augustine asks, how could God allow the suffering of innocent infants? Augustine wielded incredible power as a theologian in his century, and his point of view neatly coincided with the acceptance of Christianity by the Roman Empire. Contrary to previous Christian views of complete moral freedom and the ability to self-govern, Augustine declared that government, ie Rome, was necessary in the light of man's corrupt nature.

Julian and Pelagius are the two theologians who were most vocal in defending the “traditional” Christian view of moral freedom. Julian read the fall of Adam as exactly that, the fall of Adam, not of humanity. He read it as a true parable about the “spiritual death” of people when they freely choose to sin and disobey God. When God said that Adam would die when he ate the fruit, it was not a physical death, for Adam did not immediately die as promised, but it was a spiritual death, for then Adam and Eve were ashamed of themselves and began a process of decay.

Julian, not a scientist but nonetheless possessing insight, saw death as natural. For when God declared that man should return to dust, it was because “you are earth” not because they sinned. Sickness and natural disasters are not a result of man's sin, for man has never held such power, but are part of nature. As such, they are not evil. Suffering is natural, but misery, which is how man deals with suffering, is a voluntary condition.

Isn't this so interesting??!! Or am I just being a complete booknerd right now? Lol Anywho, how did Augustine manage to so convince the majority of Christians to adopt the idea of original sin? The book does not presume to answer such a big question, but it proposes that Augustine's theory filled a void that existed. People of all cultures tend to experience blame and guilt for suffering, whether caused by “sin” or not, because this supports the idea of a universe governed by moral cause and effect. It gives control to humans and declares that their actions have significance in the world, whether for good or evil. Is guilt a good trade-off for this sense of control? Perhaps, since most humans are, according to Spong, affected by the trauma of self-consciousness.

Anyways, the book also addressed the debate in the early Christian world of whether virginity or marriage is better. It's rather interesting to see how our current Christian praise of virgins has developed. Whew! Ok, I'll give your brains a rest now. Lol

I just started my job at Borders on Tuesday, and I absolutely love it!! I adore shelving and pulling books, helping people find particular authors, giving recommendations, ringing up sales, etc. This is like my dream job basically! Haha Anyways, other than that, not much else has been going on that I will detail. Some relationship drama, but that's about all. Hope you all are getting ready to enjoy this last month of summer!