Refer to a following article “Alienation” The Christadelphian March 1954

The Christadelphian August 1953, John Carter

“A Letter on Sin, Condemnation Etc”

A21 Hendon Road,

Sparkhill,

Birmingham, 11,

England.

22nd June, 1953

Dear bro. —

I have now received a copy of The Advocate for May in which is reproduced your letter to myself of Jan. 19. Since this letter has been given publicity I ask the opportunity for a similar publicity to this reply. You expressly deny that the views I mentioned in the notes of my journey in U.S.A., which were put to me by an Advocate brother, represent the views of the Advocate brethren in general. I am glad that such is the case, but while you make this disclaimer, in the same issue of The Advocate in which your communication to me is printed, there is also reproduced a section of a chapter of The World’s Redemption, in which ideas are expressed which are bound up with the very ideas you repudiate. What are we to understand is your position?

You suggest I lend my aid to reunion with the Advocate brethren as I have with the Berean and Central brethren. There is a difference in the position with you and with the Bereans. Both Central and Berean ecclesias recognize the same Statement of Faith: you appear to oppose some items of our Statement, and these matters therefore require clarification.

It is over fifty years ago that the division occurred in U.S.A. which led to the formation of the Advocate fellowship. The division is by many supposed to concern Resurrectional Responsibility, but this is only partly correct: the issue was deeper than that. The denial of resurrectional responsibility was based upon a theory of Adamic Condemnation and of the sacrifice of Christ in relation to it. This is seen by the very title, The Blood of the Covenant, which J. J. Andrew gave to his pamphlet setting forth similar views. This theory of Adamic condemnation leads logically to the conclusion on resurrectional responsibility which you advocate and to the doctrine put to me by the Advocate brother which you zealously repudiate. Do you with equal zeal repudiate the foundation error?

Thomas Williams, in one of his pamphlets, says that error can assume logical forms. This is true in his own case. By using words to which usage has given two meanings and transferring conclusions from one to the other, we can get strange results. “Sin” is used in the Scriptures in a primary literal sense, and also by a figure of speech in a secondary (but not unimportant) sense. Guilt attaches to “sin” in the first sense but not in the second; but to transfer a conclusion that is true to the first definition to a statement in which the word is used in the figurative sense, while having a show of logic, is disastrous to truth.

Let us look at the statement on page 106 of the May Advocate. The writer (T.W.) attaches meanings to words which sound all right until they are examined. He says Christ brought into force “the law of resurrection in himself” and the word “law” has the emphasis of italics. Will you tell me what “law” means here? When you have explained it you will find that a meaning is attached to it which when applied to Paul’s words “the law of the spirit of life” with which the author associates the phrase, evidently as synonymous, cannot be sustained.

The writer contrasts “the law of sin and death” and “the law of the spirit of life”. The former is connected with Adam and the latter with Christ, and a man must transfer from being under one law to the other by “a change of relationship”. The law is thought of apparently as some rule or enactment which governs and defines men’s relationship. A man who is outside “the law of the spirit of life”, by which law apparently men are raised from death, can only be raised by the exercise of “a divine prerogative”. The phrases “in Adam” and “in Christ” are quoted as terms of federal relationship: “the ‘all’ in each case is qualified by ‘in’, for ‘in Adam’ men are not ‘in Christ’.”

Leaving aside the fact that the distinction drawn between “law” and “prerogative” cannot be sustained by Scripture, let us be sure what Thos. Williams meant by “the law of sin and death”. In his pamphlet Adamic Condemnation, he quotes a pamphlet by A. T. Jannaway. The latter said:

“There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. Of this we have much Bible proof. Adam discovered it at the expense of his life; and the law of sin and death instituted at the time of the transgression has brought the lesson down to us.”

You will observe that the writer says that the law of sin and death was instituted at the time of transgression; that is, after the Edenic commandment had been given. This we hope to show is correct; and the author’s meaning seems obvious. But when Thos. Williams is summarizing what A. T. Jannaway had written, he said, “That the law of sin and death against which there was rebellion at the outset of man’s career . . .” Do you not see how Thos. Williams has changed the very meaning of A. T. Jannaway’s words? The reason for this, evident to every careful reader of Thos. Williams’ writings, is that “the law of sin and death” had assumed a particular (and an erroneous) meaning in his mind, and he immediately transfers his meaning into the language of A. T. Jannaway with violence to the context in so doing. We are not mistaken in this conclusion, for on the next page Thos. Williams speaks of “reconciliation from ‘the law of sin and death’”, and from the “separation” and “alienation” which Adam brought upon mankind. The law of sin and death is a “law”, an edict, under which there is separation and death. Thos. Williams thought of the Edenic commandment as the “law of sin and death”. With this idea he and J. J. Andrew agreed. On the opening page of The Blood of the Covenant, J. J. Andrew says: “The Edenic law is subsequently termed the law of sin and death, and the Abrahamic is called ‘the law of the spirit of life’.”

This application of Paul’s words not only attaches a meaning to “law” he did not intend, but it also perverts completely his meaning. In ch. 7 of Romans, Paul describes the frustration in fulfilling the law that he experienced because of “sin that dwells in him”. Sin is personified as a master—Paul was “sold under sin”. He found this “sin” to be a “law in his members”, “a law—evil present with me”, and he defines it also as “the law of sin in his members”. Clearly by the law of sin he means the impulses toward sin that mark human nature. This is the context of the phrase “law of sin and death” and the added words show that these impulses belong to mortal bodies which at last die. The antithetical phrase “law of the spirit of life” likewise has its source in the same context. By his knowledge of God another rule of life was operating in Paul, which he variously calls “the law of God after the inward man” in which he delighted; and “the law of my mind”. There was an “I” that assented to God’s law and sought to obey it; and an “I” that prevailed in waywardness, a “me” (that is, my flesh) in which dwelt “no good thing”. This law of the mind, “the inward man”, is “the law of the spirit”, to which Paul adds “of life” because if the way of life is followed it leads to life. A careful consideration of the context of Rom. 8:2 (context both before and after) leaves no doubt what is Paul’s meaning. It also shows that Thos. Williams gave to “law” a meaning quite different from Paul’s intention. Contrast now the lucid exposition of Dr. Thomas in Elpis Israel:

“Where the truth has possession of the sentiments, setting them to work and so forming the thoughts, it becomes the law of God to keep them; which the apostle styles “the law of his mind”; and because it is written there through the hearing of ‘the law and the testimony’, which came to the prophets and apostles through the spirit, he terms it, ‘the law of the spirit’ inscribed ‘on fleshy tables of the heart’; and ‘the law of the spirit of life’ because, while obeyed, it confers a right to eternal life.”

Quotations could be given from the pen of bro. Roberts showing he understood Rom. 8:2 in the same way as Dr. Thomas.

Turn now to Thos. Williams’ application of Paul’s words in 1 Cor. 15:22. “The ‘all’ in each case”, he says, “is qualified by the ‘in’; for ‘in Adam’ men are not ‘in Christ’, these being terms of federal relationship.” Now while the phrase “in Christ” expresses a believer’s union and identification with Christ in many cases, the context must fix the meaning in each case. The phrase “in Adam” occurs here only. We must not be misled concerning Paul’s meaning because of a rather loose use of the phrase occasionally in our literature. Read what Paul says. He has been cataloguing the list of consequences if Jesus had not been raised, and before he finished his list, as though he could not bear to complete it in view of the stupendous fact that Jesus was risen, he says, “Now is Christ risen and become the firstfruits of them that slept”. Man is subject to death by a man’s act, and resurrection has come by a man. What man has brought death? and what man has achieved resurrection? and who will share his resurrection life? Adam brought death into the world; by Jesus has come resurrection; and only those who will share his resurrection life are in Paul’s thought; therefore the “all” must be qualified in both cases either by “they” or “we”—“they” if we think of those asleep in Christ who will be raised to eternal life, or “we” if we think of all, living or dead, who will share in immortality. In either case Paul says as death has come to them by Adam, so resurrection and life comes to them through Christ. That Paul’s thought is limited here to those who attain to everlasting life is evident from his next words: “But every man in his own order; Christ the firstfruits, afterwards they that are Christ’s at his coming”. The sweep of Paul’s thought is not “a line drawn” that defines “federal relationship” and a “legacy of death and dust”, but he is thinking of fundamental facts in connection with those who are described as “those that are Christ’s”; and the “all”, despite Thos Williams’ assertion, is the same in both phrases. Let me now quote Dr. Thomas, again from Elpis Israel:

“The apostle then brings to light two sentences which are co-extensive” (that is, they cover the same people) “but not co-etaneous” (that is, they do not operate at the same time) “in their bearing upon mankind. The one is a sentence of condemnation, which consigns ‘the many’, both believing Jews and Gentiles, to the dust of the ground; the other is a sentence which affects the same ‘many’, and brings them out of the ground again to return thither no more. Hence, of the saints it is said, ‘The body is dead because of sin; but the spirit (gives) life because of righteousness’; for ‘since by a man came death, by a man also came a resurrection of dead persons. For as in Adam they all die, so also in Christ shall they all be made alive. But every one in his own order: Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming’. It is obvious that the apostle is not writing of all the individuals of the human race; but only of that portion of them that become the subject of ‘a justification of life’.”

Bro. Roberts’ teaching agreed with Dr. Thomas. In The Christadelphian, 1894 (page 263), written at the time of the trouble over J. J. Andrew’s new teaching, he said:

“The statement of Paul in 1 Cor. 15:20–22, throws no light on the question of who will rise to condemnation at the resurrection. It relates wholly to triumph over death by resurrection to immortality, which only those in Christ will attain. You will see this if you carefully consider the terms of the statement: ‘Now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept’, that is, risen from the dominion of death, risen to die no more; which, without controversy, was the fact in Christ’s case. Christ was ‘the first fruits of them that slept’ in this sense; he was not the first fruits in the sense of having been the first to merely come out of the grave; for many others preceded him. ‘For since by man came death by man came also resurrection of the dead’; that is, death came by Adam; life by Christ; not resumed mortal life but everlasting life. Resumed mortal life would merely be the state that came by Adam restored. Resumed mortal life was an exemplified phenomenon before Christ. Paul is dealing with the subject in its broad contrasts, not with reference to details. ‘For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive’, that is, ‘we all’; not all men absolutely, but the ‘all’ of whom both states ‘in Adam’ and ‘in Christ’ can be predicated, namely, those who are in Christ. The state ‘in Christ’ cannot be predicated of mankind in general. This limitation of the ‘all’ is imposed by the very next verse: ‘But every man in his own order; Christ the firstfruits, afterwards those who are Christ’s at his coming.’ . . . By ‘made alive’ he means brought entirely from death, quickened, immortalized, which though comprehending emergence from the grave, does not by any means consist wholly of that. To be the subject of a true ‘making alive’, a man must be in Christ; but he does not require to be in Christ to merely resume mortal life for condemnation; for God condemns men, not because of their attempted conformity to Him, but because of refusal to submit to Him. His approbation is for thorough conformity, and therefore for those in Christ.”

But Thos. Williams reduced “made alive” merely to emergence from the grave.

Let us now follow out a little Thos. Williams’ ideas on federal relationship. We are born into a world of sinners and like every member of the race inherit a sinful nature, which has produced sin in all but the Lord Jesus. Our nature is our misfortune and not our fault, for we could not help ourselves. Such, in the Doctor’s words “will not be condemned to the second death because they were born sinners; nor to any other pains and penalties than those which are the common lot of humanity in the present life. They are simply under that provision of the constitution of sin which says, ‘Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return’” (Elpis Israel).

In contrast, Thos. Williams says that we inherit a condemnation from Adam other than a physical disability. In Adamic Condemnation, he says: “We are not personally responsible for Adam’s personal sin and are not therefore baptized for it in that sense; but federally we are all under Adam’s sin and are baptized to remove the condemnation that came thereby, and to place us in Christ reconciled to God” (page 16). That this “condemnation” is not simply a sharing in the physical effects of sin is seen by the antithesis between condemnation and reconciliation and also by the further words: “Adam’s condemnation brings a physical disability inherited from Adam.” Observe the two things are regarded as separate: one is a legal enactment, the other physical effect.

Now what does baptism do? Mark the words: “We are freed from this federal condemnation and reconciled to God at baptism, but we are not freed from physical disability till the change of body”. There is, then, a personal condemnation besides physical disability, which is part of our inheritance as members of Adam’s race. To quote again, “In baptism there is a transition from a state of alienation in Adam to citizenship in Christ; and that through it we shall ultimately be freed from the physical effects of Adam’s sin: in baptism we are freed from Adamic condemnation so far as relationship is concerned”.

The following from the Advocate, Vol. 9, page 9, states this matter if possible more emphatically:

“Now Adam was on probation before he sinned; but he fell from that and had no right to ‘run for eternal life’ unless reconciliation took place and he became freed from the alienation his sin had caused. Now, if a child is born under the same condemnation that Adam brought upon himself, does it not follow that he is born under the bondage of that which causes alienation, and that before he can ‘enter as a probationer’ to ‘run for eternal life, he must be freed from that bondage by passing out of Adam into Christ? And is not that what baptism primarily is for? although it includes the remission of individual sin.”

What the writer of these words thought of this condemnation as bringing personal guilt is evident. We borrow the following quotations but give references:

“An adult devoid of personal transgression would upon baptism be forgiven Adamic sin” (Adv., 1893, page 8).

“An adult devoid of personal transgression would upon baptism into Christ have the Adamic sin remitted” (Adv., 1894, page 334).

“The grounds of guilt are first Adamic sin, and second, an aggravation of Adamic sin by the wickedness of his descendants” (Adv., Vol. 9, page 235).

“The redemption Christ wrought out was not simply from individual sins of our own, but from the sin and all its consequences of Adam the first” (Adv., Vol. 9, page 11).

“If it is this sin (i.e. Adam’s) that has placed us in alienation, does it not follow that it (i.e. Adam’s sin) must be removed, remitted, pardoned, or whatever term is thought the most expressive, before reconciliation to God can be accomplished” (Adv., Vol. 9, page 10).

This is not an accidental and unfortunate way of putting a matter—the phrasing or its equivalent were too often repeated.

The truth has freed us from the “much foolishness that has been written upon original sin” but this language takes us back to the papal doctrine of original sin and guilt. For how can we be forgiven something unless we are held guilty: and how can we be redeemed from the sin of Adam and its effects unless we are involved in both his sin and its effects?

Let me now quote Thos. Williams’ teaching on the purpose of baptism against this background: Adamic Condemnation (page 14): “The passing out of Adam into Christ changes our relationship, but does not change our nature. Therefore since the design of baptism is for this purpose its root is to be found in the adamic sentence (caps. by J.C.) of death and burial; and its effect is the removal of this so that the sentence may be deprived of its power to hold us in death and dust, and thereby the resurrection becomes the means of final physical escape from the results of Adam’s sin”.

Mark the words the author printed in italics—there is a sentence that has power to hold us in dust. There we have the false basis for the denial of resurrectional responsibility; but, further, since baptism is designed to remove this sentence, will you explain what radical difference there is between this teaching and that which I reported in The Christadelphian and which the Advocate editors wish to repudiate? Thos. Williams truly recognized the forgiveness of personal sins but did he not call them an “incident”—could he say other when the “design of baptism” is rooted in the Adamic sentence, and “this sentence” is removed in baptism? This is the “original sin” of the papal school.

The fact is that there is no sentence with power to hold us in dust, if God wills to raise anyone. The sentence in Eden simply consigned Adam to the dust and his posterity inherit mortality and so die also. “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” The double entail of sinfulness and deathfulness is evident to all. Because sin was the active cause of these evils, by the figure which puts cause for effect, they are called “sin”, and so the word in the phrase “sin in the flesh” represents “the physical principle of the animal nature, which is the cause of all its diseases, death and resolution into dust. It is that in the flesh ‘which has the power of death’ and it is called ‘sin’ because the development, or fixation, of this evil in the flesh, was the result of transgression” (Elpis Israel). Sinfulness and mortality are our inheritance through the first man—not a sentence which can hold us in the grave.

Let me now quote in contrast to Thos. Williams’ teaching what R. Roberts wrote on the subject at the time of the controversy:

“As to the sin of Adam which brought death, it is neither scriptural nor reasonable to speak of our being forgiven that. We never were guilty of it. We inherit the effects of it. It is always our own transgressions that are spoken of as the subject of baptismal forgiveness. The sentence of death which we inherit from Adam is (contingently) annulled in baptism, but this is never spoken of as “the forgiveness of Adamic transgression’.” (The Christadelphian, 1893, p. 297.)

“to talk of ‘imputing sin’ is to confuse our understanding with an unscriptural conception. ‘Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin’—that is, to whom the Lord will not impute his own sin, but will forgive him his sins: the idea of imputing somebody else’s sins to him is foreign alike to the Scriptures and commonsense. It belongs truly to the papalized theology from which we have been delivered.” (1894, page 304.)

—Men were baptized in the apostolic age for the remission of their individual sins—always. Read and see if it is not so; never for condemnation in Adam. This is an affair of nature, as established by law. We are not delivered from the death we inherit in Adam till mortality (that is, constitutional deathfulness) is ‘swallowed up of life’.” (1896, page 382.)

It is important to observe the operation of Thos. Williams’ theory in the case of the Lord Jesus: it runs like this: The Adamic sentence brings alienation; Jesus was born under Adamic condemnation, and therefore he was alienated from God; or, in his own words: “Sin which caused man’s fall made redemption necessary. Sin was the cause; a state of nature and a relationship of alienation of man from God was the result” (Rectification, page 24). To this might be added other quotations, but enough have been given.

Thos. Williams, therefore, puts two questions: (1) Was Jesus ever an alien from God? (2) Was Jesus ever an alien from ‘the law of the spirit of life’? and he tries to make a distinction. But even on his own premises, on his own definition of words, it is an artificial distinction, for a man cannot be an alien to a law; he can only be an alien to an individual or to a society. Further, if for the sake of argument a distinction is allowed between God and the law of the spirit of life, on the very meaning Thos. Williams attaches to the phrase (though a wrong meaning), can we make a distinction in fact? Would not the law be God’s law? And could an individual be not an alien to God but at the same time be an alien to God’s own law? When a theory leads to such an absurdity there is something wrong with it.

But we have already seen that Thos. Williams’ idea of “the law of the spirit of life” is an invention of his own, and not at all what Paul meant. “The law of the spirit of life” is the law of the renewed mind—to use Dr. Thomas’s words, the mode of thinking and feeling created in a true believer by the divine law and testimony. Was Jesus ever an “alien” from this scriptural law of the spirit of life? The fact is Thos. Williams dealt in abstractions in these matters, instead of getting at facts. But we see where such abstractions lead when we are asked such questions as “Was Jesus an alien from the law of the spirit of life?” But again we will quote bro. Roberts and mark the contrast: “Christ himself did no wrong, and was never alienated from God, but always did that which pleased Him, both prior to and after his baptism.”

There is another consequence of the theories we are examining—logically worked out, but wrong in its conclusion. If Adamic sentence brings us to the grave and if not countermanded holds us there, then if the death of Christ removes the sentence it only confers a resurrection of the body. We read in “Burning Questions”, Advocate, Dec. 1907:

“Death is an effect; there is no effect without a cause. The cause, one man; the effect, death. What is the antithesis of this? ‘By man came also the resurrection of the dead.’ The second man was the cause of the resurrection. Some will say, That means He was the cause of eternal life. That is true, but Paul does not say that here; let us stick to the word, as we say to “orthodox’ people when they say that means something else. Stick to the law and the testimony. ‘By man came death’; then man was the cause, death was the result. ‘By man came also the anastasis,’ standing again; He was the cause, anastasis was the effect. If the first man had not come, the death would not have come. If the second had not come, the anastasis would not have come, unless you can have an effect without a cause.”

In the context of these words there occurs again the mistaken application of Paul’s words about “the law of the spirit of life” and again an artificial dealing with “law”, with the result that what Paul is teaching has been achieved by Jesus is simply emergence from the tomb. But it is upon this faulty but specious reasoning that the conclusion is reached that apart from “the antithetic” law in Christ no one can be raised. So is dismissed the doctrine of the responsibility to judgment of men who despise God’s goodness and forbearance not knowing that God is leading them to repentance.

It might be said that we have been quoting what was written fifty years ago. Let us remember that we began our investigation with an extract from The World’s Redemption, reprinted last year, and reproduced in the Advocate in the current year. But let me add a quotation from a pamphlet by a living Advocate brother:

“While personal sins are ‘not reckoned’ in the sight of God, yet they must be ‘repented of’, turned away from—a state of mind reached by a knowledge of the gospel and a determination to turn away. All this amounts to nothing though as far as change of relationship is concerned. Your relationship from Adamic condemnation to justification takes place when you are buried by ‘baptism into Christ’s death’.”

By way of rejoinder to this we quote from R. R. to one in the same position nearly sixty years ago:

“This ‘Adamic sin’ appears to have choked you and blinded you. Who ever heard of ‘Repent and be baptised for the remission of Adamic sin?’ ‘Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of Adam’s sin?’ ‘Forgotten that he was purged from his Adamic sin?’ ‘Hath washed us from Adamic sin?’ Nay, nay: this is the old theological smoke. Come out into the clean air. Adam’s mortal nature we have, but the sins that want forgiving are our own.”

Our appeal to the readers of The Advocate is to abjure the errors that were introduced by a previous editor and get back to the truth set forth in the writings of Dr. Thomas and Robert Roberts. It is a serious matter for each one; for if we are only baptized for Adam’s sin, how can we expect the forgiveness of our own sins which God has made to depend “upon baptism for the remission of sins”? In this retracing of your steps we shall find the harmony that makes unity not only a possibility but a duty.

Fraternally yours,

John Carter.