What is sin, really?
There is nothing quite like Paul’s letter to the Romans.
Here we have the most in-depth exposition on the nature of salvation found in scripture. You’ll find the same core truths repeated elsewhere. But only in Romans are themes like justification, imputed righteousness, and atonement unpacked exhaustively.
Chapter 1 introduces the Gospel and all its implications as the subject of Romans. Then Paul goes wide to describe humanity’s state of rebellion against God, and our penchant to suppress the truth. Everyone needs redemption it turns out, whether Jew or Gentile. Humans should know this is true even apart scripture. Our skewed consciences are still tuned well enough to tell us something is wrong, and we that require a solution outside ourselves. God shows no partiality when it comes to salvation.
Every single person needs saved.
To drive his point home, Paul machine guns out Old Testament quotes that teach human beings are, without exception, totally depraved. Nine quotes to be exact, and all from the Psalms.
“There is no one righteous, not even one;
there is no one who understands;
there is no one who seeks God.
All have turned away,
they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.”
“Their throats are open graves;
their tongues practice deceit.”
“The poison of vipers is on their lips.”
“Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
“Their feet are swift to shed blood;
ruin and misery mark their ways,
and the way of peace they do not know.”
“There is no fear of God before their eyes.
While you can see in context what he’s getting at, the full premise is tough to swallow. Paul’s language is so sweeping. So total. Is it really true that no one at all is righteous? Is everyone really as bad as Paul/David is making them out to be?
What about our heroes and change-makers?
What about my grandma!? It’s hard for me to read “their throats are open graves” and think of Nancy Winter West who seems like she fell out of a Norman Rockwell painting.
This Biblical teaching (referred to by theologians as “total depravity”) is culturally confusing for us on a number of levels. Some progressive thinkers try to deal with the tension by deemphasizing the concept of sin. However doing away with sin philosophically doesn’t do us any favors.
For one thing sin is an undeniable reality. Worldviews that try to ignore it’s existence might seem tenable in certain insulated cultural moments. But the brokenness of the world and the culpability of those who inhabit it can only be ignored for so long. This is why G.K. Chesterton once referred to original sin as the “only part of Christian theology which can really be proved.”
Yet the cultural dissonance remains, and many of us remain confused. Finding emotional resolution will require digging a bit deeper. We need a broader understanding of what sin is before we can accept that it truly does affect the whole human condition.
The New Testament gives us six common terms for sin. Each contributes something different to our understanding, gradually filling out the concept.
First is hamartia (ἁμαρτία)[1] which is the Greek word most commonly translated as “sin.” Hamartia means to “miss the mark” or “fall short.” It’s doing the wrong thing, rather than the right thing. This is how most people think of sin – making bad choices.
Second is anomia (ἀνομία) meaning “lawlessness.” The lawless person lives unbound. They refuse to submit to a moral will outside their own. It involves an attitude of defiance toward God coupled with a demand to have things their own way.
Paraptoma (παράπτωμα) is usually translated as “trespass.” It can mean intentional or unintentional deviation from the right path. Destructive choices don’t always have to be willful. Moral error can come in gradually through foolish ignorance.
Parakoe (παρακοή) is “disobedience.” The English translation feels inadequate, because in context this word typically means “refusing to heed or listen.” It can also describe an attitude of indifference or inattention to something that is truly important.
When the word pomeria (πονηρός) is used it refers to the “wickedness”, or corrupt motives lurking within one’s heart – which is where Jesus teaches sin begins.
Finally, adikea (ἀδικία) is “unrighteousness” which plays out as injustice on a group or societal level.
These terms and how they are used in scripture demonstrate that sin is far more than just doing a few bad things that harm ourselves or others. Our problem is far more complex.
Sin is most recognizable when it’s heinous and externally expressed (like the murder or deception named in Romans 3). But its root is always internal (pride, self-righteousness, selfishness, hate). Both what happens outside and inside a person counts as sin. This was the point Jesus drove home against the religious worldview of the Pharisees in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:21-48).
In connection, sin is both commissive and omissive. It’s not just doing the wrong thing, but failing to do what we ought to do. A father who physically abuses his children for instance is guilty of a clear and serious sin. Both so is the father who emotionally neglects his children due to preoccupation with his career, or personal insecurity. Some of our world’s greatest evils persist because of human inaction.
Sin is in the first place personal. But it is also societal. Scripture teaches we all stand accountable to God for ourselves. We aren’t judged directly for the sins of our fathers (Ezekiel 18:20). But being relational and communal beings requires we share some level of moral responsibility for the state of the world around us. This is why God’s rebuke of the people of Israel in Isaiah 1:23 includes the fact that their leaders had failed to care for the widows and orphans.
In our own day there are an estimated 50 million active slaves. This is a staggering number compared to the only 4 million that were in the Antebellum south. Most of these slaves are forced laborers in food and garment industries. They are in large part the reason the world economy can deliver new racks of cheap fashion every season.
Now it’s true that we have no choice but to buy food and clothing. There are few options available to us untainted by systemically exploitive industries. The exact ethics of how we should deal with these hard realities are opaque. In many cases there are issues of conscience involved for each of us to consider before the Lord. But we should be able to see clearly and agree that none of us are untouched by these cumulative human evils.
Ultimately, sin is both before God and against other people. David understood this well, which is why he prayed “before you alone oh God I have sinned” (Psalm 51:4) after being exposed for his adultery with Bathsheba. This example is interesting because David certainly also sinned against Bathsheba, Uriah, and even the people of Israel. But he saw himself as first accountable to his (and their) creator.
Even when sin appears “harmless” to others, it still represents an afront to God. In the end humans are poor judges of what counts as harm. All people tend to draw the line of righteousness right below themselves. This is why convicted criminals typically aren’t permitted to set their own sentences! Most of us would let ourselves off with a warning - no matter the crime.
Zooming out and looking at the whole of scripture’s teaching on sin should help us better understand what Paul is saying in Romans 3:10-19. It’s not that any of us are as bad as we possibly could be (thankfully). But no matter our background or up bringing – each of us is broken due to our disconnection from God.
Often the way sin expresses itself in a person’s life has less to do with how uniquely and innately sinful they are (we all check that box), and more so their opportunities and circumstances. Like gas, sin tends to fill the space it’s given. This is why sudden increases in wealth or power are often corrupting. Wealth and power don’t create sin. Sin is already there in each of us. But they do tend to open up new horizons for sin’s expression.
Paul restates his thesis in Romans 3:23, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” But fortunately, that’s not where the argument ends. God doesn’t drive home the point of human sinfulness just so we will feel bad and grovel. Instead, he hopes that if we can grasp the desperate nature of our situation, then we might be humble enough to receive a radical solution.
This is the “good news” of the Gospel, and it’s what Paul turns to in Romans 3:24-25: “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.”
You see, our relative moral goodness won’t correct the problem. In fact, it will probably just make us more self-righteous and therefore sinful. For sin to come out by the root we require drastic intervention. That intervention is what Christian’s call the “incarnation.” God became man. He entered into our world and took on the weight of our sins, suffering judgment in our place. It only takes faith (trust) in what Jesus did on the cross for us to be made right (justified) with God. Once the penalty of sin is dealt with, God’s Spirit can enter our lives and start to undermine sin’s residual power. As sin’s power is undermined among groups of Christians (the church), we work together to undermine it in society. But before long Jesus himself will return to initiate his Kingdom and overthrow sin’s very presence.
Seeing sin for what it really is should cause us to acknowledge we have it in our lives as much as anyone else. Christians who read Paul’s words in Romans and only think of other people are missing the point. You, I, and everyone all need God’s mercy.
What an incredible thing that despite the complex and total nature of sin – we have full salvation through Jesus.
[1] All Greek references come from Strong’s concordance accessed through https://biblehub.com/greek