The serpent’s seed

@moonbus wrote in another thread:
Adam and Eve had no power to make a new soul; only God can ensoul a fertilised ovum. Adam and Eve could procreate only a material body. Adam's sin died with him, as did Eve's; no particle of their sin was transferred to their progeny, because only God can ensoul a zygote. So, if a baby is born with a sinner's soul, that is God's handiwork, not Adam's or Eve's.

Let’s explore this; I find it a fascinating topic.

As Moonbus says, only god can create a soul. So how does the “original sin” which the bible explains we all have as we were all “in Adam” when he sinned….how does it get passed through the generations? Well if it not in the soul/spirit then it can only be in the DNA. But how does eating a fruit of a tree alter a human’s DNA?

Clearly, and despite KellyJay’s and Jospehw’s protestations, the trees and the tree fruit as metaphors fro something else. Suppose the forbidden fruit was a the age old proverbial SEX!

This would mean that when the bible says that the serpent beguiled Eve and she took the fruit and ate…and then showed it to her husband and he took it and ate it… that Eve had sexual intercourse with the serpent, who was not a snake but a bipedal being who was cursed and made to crawl on his belly for the rest of time.

So the serpent impregnated Eve and Eve conceived!
Adam also had sexual relations with the serpent as prompted by his wife and the episode infected him and altered his DNA forever.

This is a bit of a fringe doctrine but it’s an interesting one nonetheless.

More here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serpent_seed

The Western concept of original sin is inaccurate. In English, the Orthodox often call it ancestral sin, and it does not speak about how there is a literal transmission through wich an infant is born imputed with a sin for which they would go to hell/limbo if not repented for or baptized, but rather that all man has within them a natural, unavoidable inclination to sin.

So that when we reach the age of culpability, we will invariably sin in some capacity.

So, all of this other talk is extraneous, I think, and misses the point.

I also believe ti is the case that nobody ever stated that Adam & Eve through their powers ensoul. It seems like a strawman position, though I do assume that at some point in the two thousand year old history of Christianity it has been embraced.... Though I doubt it would be in those terms.

@philokalia said
In English, the Orthodox often call it ancestral sin, and it does not speak about how there is a literal transmission through wich an infant is born imputed with a sin for which they would go to hell/limbo if not repented for or baptized, but rather that all man has within them a natural, unavoidable inclination to sin.

I think this is one of the points made in the OP.

@philokalia said
So that when we reach the age of culpability, we will invariably sin in some capacity.

Yes, this is the concept of original sin.

@philokalia said
So, all of this other talk is extraneous, I think, and misses the point.

All what “talk”? What point?

The premise in the OP is the point being made.

@philokalia said
I also believe ti is the case that nobody ever stated that Adam & Eve through their powers ensoul. It seems like a strawman position, though I do assume that at some point in the two thousand year old history of Christianity it has been embraced.... Though I doubt it would be in those terms.

If nobody has ever said (whatever the term means in your italics), then how can it be a strawman?

Apologists for evolution's wide-ranging synergy wrote the human yolk sac off as an unremarkable carryover from early reptilian life. A new study found evidence, yolk from human blastocyst cells support the unique, organized anticipatory development, so as to defy thinking it only something voided out from an evolutionary track.

Anyways, it's possible to infer about the egg which came to be implanted or unused.... going by hunches the first woman had everything to live in subsistence on without defect. But temptation occurred, where perhaps, contamination rather than introducing itself profligately, resigned to first cellular losses.

@of-ants-and-imps said
Apologists for evolution's wide-ranging synergy wrote the human yolk sac off as an unremarkable carryover from early reptilian life. A new study found evidence, yolk from human blastocyst cells support the unique, organized anticipatory development, so as to defy thinking it only something voided out from an evolutionary track.

Anyways, it's possible to infer abo ...[text shortened]... rhaps, contamination rather than introducing itself profligately, resigned to first cellular losses.

Perhaps you could write that again in a way which makes some sense?

@divegeester
The yolk sac in human embryos is cited as evidence for the same in birds or reptiles of common evolution. But it's not so remotely alike according to the new research yet we'll never be sure.

I just watched the film The World, the Flesh and the Devil. Ralph signifies the Adam figure, Sarah like Eve the helpmate and love interest, and Benson is either a second Adam, a dividing brother figure or competition to prove the scale of love. The devil wants to compete and will use any means. But the power in woman to protect and enumerate life can give a sudden and fateful defeat, thus I doubt the angelic forces saw what mother of all living earth had in store. The fall [out] did diminish human capabilities, however.

@of-ants-and-imps said
I just watched the film The World, the Flesh and the Devil. Ralph signifies the Adam figure, Sarah like Eve the helpmate and love interest, and Benson is either a second Adam, a dividing brother figure or competition to prove the scale of love. The devil wants to compete and will use any means. But the power in woman to protect and enumerate life can give a sudden an ...[text shortened]... at mother of all living earth had in store. The fall [out] did diminish human capabilities, however.

Well said.

🤔

@divegeester said
Yes, this is the concept of original sin.

Yet it is called by some ancestral sin to distinguish it from the Catholic doctrine of original sin and clarify that we do not believe that the child is born with literal sin.

@philokalia said
Yet it is called by some ancestral sin to distinguish it from the Catholic doctrine of original sin and clarify that we do not believe that the child is born with literal sin.

What it’s called is largely irrelevant isn’t it.
The Bible is clear throughout that humans are born into sin.

@divegeester said
What it’s called is largely irrelevant isn’t it.
The Bible is clear throughout that humans are born into sin.

OK, and what do you mean by that, exactly?

The position that I describe as ancestral sin?

Then we agree.

@philokalia said
OK, and what do you mean by that, exactly?

The position that I describe as ancestral sin?

Then we agree.

I mean that the bible witters talk repeatedly about humans being born into sin. Whatever label you want to call it is fine by me for the purposes of this discussion.