II. Objections To The Theory.
1. Groundless Assumption of a Generic Nature.—Realism itself is a mere assumption, and, as a philosophy, has long been replaced with conceptualism. General terms express general notions or conceptions, but not objective realities. There is no vegetable nature apart from its individual forms of existence, no animal nature apart from individuals. There is no existent human nature apart from individual men. In the organic realm all actual existence is in individual forms. Nominalism is right in such limitation of actual existence, though wrong in the denial of general notions as realities of mental conception. Realism is right in the admission of general notions, but wrong in the assertion of objective existences in accord with these notions. There are no such existences. Hence, there is no generic human nature.
Realism, however, exists in different forms, and is variously appropriated in doctrinal anthropology.[506] This being the case, fairness requires that in any criticism respect should be had to the particular form in which it is maintained. In the present instance the form has been definitely given. The creation of Adam was the creation of the whole human species, not in its individualities, but in its substantive existence. Adam contained in himself this whole substance. In the mode of propagation it is distributed in a manner to constitute the essential existence of each individual. The theory applies to both the physical and mental natures of man. The two are spoken of as a complex, but certainly not with the intention of sinking their distinction or reducing them to unity. Their distinction is fully recognized.
[506]Ueberweg:History of Philosophy, vol. i, pp. 358-402. Did the substance of all human bodies exist in that of Adam? Certainly not in the form and bulk of flesh and blood. This is not maintained. In place of such a nature there is posited a form of matter without bodily properties, unphenomenal and metaphysical in its mode. The existence of such a form of matter in Adam is a mere assumption. It certainly does not appear in the account of his creation (Genesis 2:7). His body was formed from the dust of the ground; and there is no suggestion of any other form of matter than science now recognizes in the constitution of the human body. In such a oneness of all human bodies with that of Adam, a portion of his body must exist in every one as its proper substance. Otherwise there is no realistic oneness with him. Any element of the body not originally of the substance of Adam is utterly useless in such a realism. In no reference of Scripture to the constitution of the human body is there any intimation of such a specific substance. Neither physics, nor chemistry, nor physiology knows any thing of it. Its existence in Adam and its individualizations into innumerable parts, so as to constitute the substantive reality of all human bodies, are pure assumptions. The theory of a generic spiritual nature created in Adam, which served as a personal mind in himself, and by successive abscissions furnishes the essence of every personal mind, is equally groundless. No direct proof is offered. Little indirect proof is even attempted. It may attempt a defense of itself by charging other theories of .the origin of individual souls with equal mystery and perplexity: as, for instance, the theory of their creation in Adam and propagation from him; or, that of their immediate and successive creations along with the propagations of the race. If all that is thus alleged is true, not an atom of proof is thus gained for this form of realism. After all that may be said either in its support or defense, it must remain a groundless speculation.
2. Impossible Individuation into the Many.—Such realism in theological anthropology requires the generic human nature to be invested with personal faculties. It must have originally existed in personality, for else it could not have committed the primitive sin. We have previously seen the full recognition of these facts, and the prompt and unreserved investment of the generic nature with personal faculties. Its individuation into the many, into the innumerable personalities of the race, is thus rendered impossible. As personally endowed and capable of free and responsible moral agency, the generic nature, on its mental side, must have existed in simple unity of spiritual essence and personality. Neither is divisible or distributable into the many. It will hardly be pretended that personality can be so treated, though it is claimed that the spiritual essence may be. How can the essence be divided without dividing or destroying the personality? Personality arises with the complex of personal faculties. The faculties are intrinsic to the spiritual essence. All distinction of essence and faculty is purely in thought. No loose connection can be allowed, which might meet the exigency of this form of realism. The whole mental essence is present in every mental faculty und active in every mental action. How then can the essence be divided without dividing or destroying the personality? This very serious difficulty presses the theory not only in respect to generic Adam, but equally in every instance of subdivision of essence in all the individual propagations of the race.
There is no escape from such difficulty through an assumption that only a small portion of the generic spiritual essence, just enough for the constitution of a single person, belonged to the personality of Adam and was active in his agency. Such an assumption would be openly contradictory to the deepest principles of the theory. It maintains the universal native sinfulness, in the double sense of corruption and guilt, on the ground that the whole generic spiritual essence was present and active in the sinning of Adam. Hence, as all human souls are individualized portions of that generic soul, they had a responsible part in the Adamic sin, are actually guilty of that sin, and justly punishable on that ground. These are the vital facts of the theory; and with no one of these can it part without self-destruction. It remains true that the generic spiritual essence in Adam, as held in this theory, existed and acted in the purest form of personality. Hence the theory cannot void the insuperable difficulties which beset the notion of its division and distribution into the innumerable personalities of the race. A statue in metal might be fused and recast into many, but only with the destruction of the original and a diminution of size according to the number of the new; but a spiritual essence existing in the mode of personality cannot be the subject of such treatment.[507] [507] Per contra, Shedd:Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 83-87.
3. Equally Sharers in all Ancestral Deeds.—We put this objection in the broadest application, and maintain that, if on the ground of a real oneness with Adam we are responsible sharers in the primitive sin, we must equally share all the sins, and all the good deeds as well, of all our intermediate ancestors. A like objection, but of narrow application, is put thus: If on the ground of a real oneness with Adam and Eve we are responsible sharers in their first sin, so must we share all their subsequent sins. The objection is logically pertinent only with respect to such sins as were committed before the division of the generic nature through propagation and the formation of separate parental headships. After such disconnection there could be no responsible sharing in their sins. The objection, however, is thoroughly valid respecting sins previously committed. A refutation of the objection so brought is attempted in this manner: “The reply is that the sinful acts of Adam and Eve after the fall differed from the act of eating the forbidden fruit in two respects: 1. They were transgressions of the moral law, not of the probationary statute. 2. They were not committed by the entire race in and with Adam.”[508] [508] Ibid., p. 88. The answer in the second point is utterly void within the limitation of the objection as above stated. On the truth of the theory, the whole race must have existed in Adam and shared in all his acts, prior to the division of the generic nature by propagation, just as completely as in the primitive sin. The answer in the first point is equally void. There is no difference between a moral law and a probationary statute, or between the transgression of the one and the other, which can in the least affect the ground of a common responsibility, as it is maintained in this theory. It is not that the Edenic law was positive in kind and probationary in economy, that all men are held to be responsible sharers with Adam in its transgression, but because all then existed in the very essence of his being, and therefore must share in his sin. Hence, as the same form of existence in Adam continued until a division of the generic nature through propagation, all men must have shared in every previous sin of Adam just as deeply as in his first sin. The theory of representation might insist upon the probationary office of the Edenic law as affecting the question of our responsibility for any other sins of Adam; but for the realistic theory, such insistence is the surrender of its deepest principle. A further reply utterly fails. To the objection that as the whole human nature remained in Adam and Eve until a division in the propagation of Cain, therefore all their previous sins as really as the first must be charged to their posterity, “the reply is that the imputation, even in this case, would not lie upon any individual persons of the posterity, for there are none, but only upon the non-individualized nature. These personal transgressions of Adam, if charged at all, could be charged only upon the species.”[509] True:
[509]Shedd:Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, p. 90. there were no individual persons of the posterity in that interval of time; and no more were there any at the time of the first sin; and in both cases the relation between Adam and his posterity was precisely the same; and the first sin, just as the later sins, must be charged to the generic nature, because as yet no individualized persons existed.
We have put the same objection more broadly: that, on the truth of this realistic theory and the reality of a responsible part of each in the primitive sin, we are all responsible sharers in all the deeds of our ancestors in the long line of descent from Adam, This position is maintained on the ground that, according to this realistic theory, we existed in each ancestor in this long line of descent in precisely the same manner in which we existed in Adam. If that manner of existence made us sharers in his sin, it must equally make us sharers in the sins, and in the good deeds as well, of all our ancestors. In the division of the generic nature through propagation, in each instance there was communicated, not only enough for the new personality, but enough more for an indefinite number of further individualizations into personalities. This law must rule the whole process of propagation. The theory requires it, and without it would become a nullity. “The specific nature was a deposited invisible substance in the first human pair. . . . As thus deposited by creation in Adam and Eve, it was to be transmitted. In like manner, every individual man along with his individuality receives, not, as Adam did, the whole of human nature, but a fraction of it, to transmit and individualize.”[510] Thus in the long line of human parentage each one receives from Adam, through his own ancestry, a non-individualized portion of the generic human nature, which he transmits through propagation. Every one possesses the portion transmitted to him in the same manner in which Adam possessed the whole. This is the theory. If it is true, it follows that every man is a sharer in all the moral deeds of his ancestry in the long line of descent from Adam.
[510]Shedd:Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, p. 90. No answer voids this consequence. The attempts signally fail. “All individuals excepting the first two include each but a fractional part of human nature. A sin committed by a fraction is not a sin committed by the whole unity. Individual transgression is not the original transgression, or Adam’s first sin.”[511] In truth, the original unity of the generic nature was severed in the creation of Eve, so that no one sin, not even the first, was committed by that whole nature. Hence this theory must admit that the presence of the whole generic nature in any one sin is not necessary to a responsible sharing therein on the part of the sinner’s offspring. Therefore this answer to our objection, which proceeds upon the assumption of a determining distinction between the whole generic nature and only a part of it as it respects the consequence of sin to the offspring of the sinner, is utterly groundless. Further answer must be attempted. That portion of the generic nature which each person receives with his own propagation, “and which he transmits, does not act with him and sin with him in his individual transgressions. It is a latent nature or principle which remains in a quiescent state, in reference to his individuality. It is inactive, as existing in him.”[512] All this is easily said; but what is the warrant for saying it? No reason is given for the alleged inactivity of that portion of the generic nature which each one receives for further individualization and transmission. We have previously seen that just as the whole was originally deposited in Adam, so a part is deposited in each individual; and, also, that the individual possesses the part in the same manner and for the same purpose of transmission that Adam possessed the whole. As the whole existed in Adam in a simple unity of spiritual essence, so the portion exists in each individual in the same unity. If the whole was active in the agency of Adam so as to constitute all men sharers in his sin, the whole part must be active in the agency of the individual and constitute his progeny, even to the latest generation, sharers in his moral deeds.
[511]Ibid., p. 91.
[512]Ibid., p. 92. The results are singular and startling; in some facts, appalling. All the descendants of Abraham in the line of Isaac shared in the faith which was accounted to him for righteousness (Romans 4:3; Galatians 3:6); and were as really as Isaac offered up by faith (Hebrews 11:17). Solomon shared in his own father’s adultery, and equally in his profound repentance. These instances are given simply as illustrations of the principle. The principle rules every individual life. What any one is through his own deeds in the present life is as nothing compared with what he is through a responsible participation in the deeds of his ancestors. The number of such deeds is beyond conception. And what a mixture of the good and the bad, the noble and the vile! deeds of every quality, and running through every grade of every quality! And how often must every one have been lost in sharing the sins of some ancestors, and saved in sharing the repentance and faith of others! As this theory is usually maintained, the appalling implication is that every one begins the present life with the accumulation upon his soul of all the sins of all his ancestors in the long line of his descent from Adam. There must be error in such a theory.
4. No Responsible Part in the Primitive Sin.—The ground on which this theory maintains a responsible sharing of all men in the primitive sin should be restated in connection with the present point. “The first sin of Adam, being a common, not an individual sin, is deservedly and justly imputed to the posterity of Adam upon the same principles upon which all sin is deservedly and justly imputed; namely, that it was committed by those to whom it is imputed.”[513] The statement proceeds with the assumption of free agency, “the free agency of all mankind in Adam,” as the ground of their responsible sharing in his sin. “This agency, though differing in the manner, is yet as real as the subsequent free agency of each individual.” The whole generic human nature existed in Adam, and was present and active in the commission of his sin.
[513]Shedd:Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, p, 186. This generic nature, simply as such, could not sin. Adam could sin only in his own personal agency, and the whole guilt of his sin was his own personal guilt. If it should be said that he was so much the greater in himself, and his guilt so much the greater, because of the presence of the whole generic nature in him, and if all this were true, it could not change the facts as above stated. It is still true, that a nature, simply in itself or without personalization, can exercise no personal agency; still true that the whole agency in the primitive sin was the personal agency of Adam himself, and the whole guilt his own. Hence, when it is said, as it often is, and as the theory requires, that the whole generic nature was present and active in Adam, the meaning must be, if there is any meaning, to the purpose, that that whole nature was personalized in him—just as any individualized portion which constitutes the spiritual essence of an individual man must be personalized in him. The theory must accept this view, or else surrender all ground of pretension even, that the whole generic nature was responsibly active in the sinning of Adam. The result gives us a wonderful Adam; an Adam who possessed in his own personality all the spiritual essence out of which, by a ceaseless process of abscission, are produced all individual minds of the race, even to the last man. He should have been far greater than he was; greater even than the infinitely exaggerated Adam of an earlier theology. He appears in no such greatness. A very serious difficulty again emerges. The theory must answer for the individualization of this Adam into the innumerable personalities of the race. He exists and acts in a simple unity of personality, just as any other individual man. The presence of the whole generic nature in him does not change this fact. To say that it does is to sunder that nature from his personality, and consequently to deny it all and any part in the Adamic sin. The most fundamental principle of the theory would thus be surrendered. The theory must answer for the requisite individualizations of such, an Adam. The task is an impossible one. The division and distribution of a spiritual essence, considered simply as an essence, into the innumerable personalities of the race transcends the utmost reach of human philosophy. The notion of such a division and distribution of such an essence, already existing in personality and active in personal agency, is utterly aberrant from all rational thinking upon such a question. The existence of the generic nature in Adam is held for the sake of its distribution into all human persons, that they may be accounted responsible sharers in his sin. The difficulties of the distribution disprove it, and consequently disprove the whole theory. This is not the whole case against the theory. Neither the existence of the generic nature in Adam, nor its division and personalization in all men, nor both together could make them guilty sharers in his sin. The reason is that on neither supposition, nor on both together, was there in them the personal agency necessary to such participation. Nor do we here attempt to force upon the theory any principle not its own. It affirms the participation of all men in the guilt of Adam’s sin, on the ground that all participated in its commission, and by the exercise of a personal agency just as real and free as any which they possess and exercise in their individual existence. In previous citations we have given repeated declarations of this principle. One appears under the present head. It is thus admitted that free personal agency is necessary to the commission of sin, and that all men can share the guilt of the first sin only on the ground of sharing its commission. This is an accepted principle of this higher realism. There was no such participation of all men in the primitive sin. The alleged ground of it is utterly inadequate. The determining facts of the question clearly show this.
“For the individuals Adam and Eve were self-conscious. So far as they were concerned, the first sin was a very deliberate and intensely willful act. The human species existing in them at that time actedin their act, and sinned in their sin, similarly as the hand or eye acts and sins in the murderous or lustful act of the individual soul. The hand or the eye has no separate self-consciousness of its own, parallel with the soul’s self-consciousness. Taken by itself, it has no consciousness at all. But its union andoneness with the self-conscious soul, in the personal union of soul and body, affords all the self-consciousness that is possible in the case. The hand is co-agent with the soul, and hence is particeps criminis, and has a common guilt with the soul. In like manner the psychico-physical human nature existing in Adam and Eve had no separate self-consciousness parallel with that of Adam and Eve. Unlike the visible hand or eye, it was an invisible substance or nature capable of being transformed into myriads of self-conscious individuals; but while in Adam, and not yet distributed and individualized, it had no distinct self-consciousness of its own, any more than the hand or eye in the supposed case. But existingand acting in and with these self-conscious individuals, it participated in their self-determination, and is chargeable with their sin, as the hand, and eye, and whole body is chargeable with the sin of the individual man. As in the instance of the individual unity, every thing that constitutes it, body as well as soul, is active and responsible for all that is done by this unity, so in the instance of the specific unity, every thing that constitutes it, namely, Adam and the human nature in him, is active and responsible for all that is done by this unity.”[514] We have given this passage at such length that the determining facts of the question might stand in the clearest light.
[514]Shedd:Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 191, 192. The illustrations of the realistic position are first in place for criticism. Neither the hand nor the eye is a guilty sharer in any sin because a bodily member of the person sinning. Neither is capable of guilt or of any moral act. The hand, for instance: what part has it in the murderous deed supposed? The murder is wholly the deed of the personal agent, and his hand is as purely instrumental to his agency as the knife with which he makes the deadly thrust. Let the hand be amputated and cast away: could it still be guilty? As well count the dagger guilty. Yet, on the principles and requirements of this theory, it ought still to be guilty. The fallacy begins with the assumption of a union and oneness of the hand with the self-conscious soul. There is no such union and oneness of the two. Nor can the hand be a co-agent with the soul, and for the reason that it is capable of no such agency. Nor can it be a particeps criminis in any sin of the soul. A particeps criminis is an actual sinner, and must have in himself the power of sinning. The same facts must be true of the hand if in any instance it is a particeps criminis. They cannot be true of the hand. The illustration betrays the weakness of the realistic position.
We may readily agree that, if the generic nature—that out of which all individual souls are produced—existed in Adam and Eve at the time of the first sin, it “is chargeable with their sin, as the hand, and eye, and whole body is chargeable with the sin of the individual man,” for that is not to be chargeable at all. Whatever the theory may assert respecting the presence of the generic nature with the personal Adam, it must ever distinguish the two and hold the separability of the latter from the former. As so separated, it is simply a nature, without personality until distributed and personalized in individual men. It is a fundamental part of this theory that every man, even from the first moment of his individual existence, is sinful. But the individualization of the generic nature into new personalities does not change its character. This is explicitly affirmed. Hence, if guilty as soon as individualized, the nature itself, and simply as such, must have been constituted guilty by the sin of Adam. But guilt is a purely personal fact, and has no ground in a mere nature. The guilt of Adam’s sin was purely personal to himself, and could no more become the guilt of a generic nature in him than the hand of a murderer could share the guilt of his crime. The theory is that the sin of Adam constituted the whole generic nature guilty, and, further, that, on the division of this nature into the innumerable individuals of the race, every one is as guilty of that sin as Adam himself. Such facts utterly disprove the theory.
