The Christadelphian March 1869, Robert Roberts

Robert Roberts’ article “The Relation of Jesus to the Law of Sin and Death” (The Christadelphian March 1869) article is mis-used by those who would misrepresent bro Roberts views on the subject by selectively quoting him. Note bro Roberts explanation of what he means as reproduced by bro John Carter in The Christadelphian November 1944.

The Christadelphian, November 1944, John Carter

Robert Roberts on “the Effects of Adam’s Fall”

In the disputations on this subject there has been reference to an article by bro. Roberts in 1869. This article contains some ambiguous expressions, and on more than one occasion “those of a contrary mind” have quoted it. In searching for something else, we have come across an explanation of his meaning in The Christadelphian, 1877, page 471. A man has a right to explain what he meant and to admit the obscurity in his terms; but if we want to quote him, we must quote what he says he meant. Here then is his explanation in 1877:

“The article in the Christadelphian for March, 1869, continues to represent our convictions on the subject of which it treats, viz., the relation of Jesus to the condemnation which we all inherit from Adam. On some details, however, of that general subject, we should, if we were writing it again, express ourselves more explicitly, in view of the searching controversy which has arisen on the subject of sin in the flesh. We should guard ourselves against forms of expression which seem to favour the false ideas that have come to be advocated. In asserting, for instance, that there was no change in the nature of Adam in the crisis of his condemnation, we should add, that though his nature continued of the order expressed in the phrase ‘living soul,’ a change occurred in the condition of that nature through the implantation of death, as recognised in the article in question on page 83, col. 2, line 15, in the statement that death ran in the blood of Mary. And on the subject of sin in the flesh, while retaining the declarations on page 83, as regards the operation of our moral powers, we should add that the effect of the curse was as defiling to Adam’s nature as it was to the ground which thenceforth brought forth briars and thorns: and that therefore, after transgression, there was a bias in the wrong direction, which he had not to contend with before transgression. Our mind has not changed on the general subject, but some of its details have been more clearly forced on our recognition by the movements and arguments of heresy.”

The Christadelphian, March 1869, Robert Roberts

“The Relation of Jesus to the Law of Sin and Death”

By the Editor.

No teaching of the New Testament is more unequivocal than that Jesus was a man, and the same kind of a man as those whom he was manifested to redeem. He was “found in fashion as a man.”—(Phil. 2:8.) He was “made in all things like unto his brethren.” (Heb. 2:17.) He was of the seed of David according to the flesh.—(Acts 2:29; Rom. 1:2; 2 Tim. 2:8). He is “the man, ” Christ Jesus.—(1 Tim. 2:5: Acts 2:22). And he is a man, not merely in the sense of being of the same general type as ourselves, but in the sense of partaking of our identical stock and nature—“Bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh.” He was not organised from the earth as Adam was: he was not produced as a new man would be produced; he was developed from a pre-existing nature with a purpose having reference to that nature which necessitated that he should be clothed in that nature as we shall see. He was born of Mary: he was elaborated from her substance as any ordinary child is from its mother’s substance, for the ordinary period elapsed from conception to birth. He therefore inherited the flesh and blood of Mary. He was made of her flesh and blood. He was built up from materials supplied by her nature in the ordinary process of fœtal development. He was therefore Mary’s nature embodied in a son. This fact is not interfered with by the fact that conception was caused by the power of the Holy Spirit; the materials made use of by the Spirit were human flesh and blood, and the result was the production of a Son of God in the nature of the condemned man whose representative and descendant Mary was. The purpose fulfilled by the Spirit’s intervention we shall presently consider. We shall find that it had to do, not with the quality of his physical nature, but with the mental quality which was the essential qualification for a successful sacrifice.

We call attention to the fact that John lays emphasis on this doctrine, that Christ had come in the flesh. He makes it a test: he says if any man confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, the same is not of God—(1 John 4:1–3, ) and he forbids the faithful to receive any who bring not this doctrine with them. We shall see a good reason for this stringency. We shall find that the fact of Christ having come in the flesh, involves a principle that lies at the bottom of the scheme of truth, of which the manifestation of Christ is but the expression; and that to surrender it or be a party to its surrender, is to be guilty of opening a leak which tends to the admission of the polluted flood which has for centuries submerged the world in death.

If Jesus came in the flesh, he was under condemnation, for the nature he inherited was a condemned one. The sentence of death ran in the blood which he inherited from Adam through Mary. He was, therefore, “in the days of his flesh,” as much under its power as those he came to save. This conclusion follows from the testimony that he was a man; it would stand secure upon that foundation alone, but it is also expressly affirmed in divers parts of the word. It is testified that he was “made sin for us.”—(2 Cor. 5:21.) As he was not of sinful character, this could only apply to his physical nature, which, drawn from the veins of Mary, was “made sin.” Again, in Rom. 8:3, we are informed that “what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God (hath done) in sending forth his son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for (or on account) of sin, condemned sin in the flesh. The word “likeness,” in this statement is taken hold of by some to suggest that Christ was not the real nature of Adam, but a different nature, bearing a mere resemblance to it. The answer to this is that in testimony quoted further on we are informed it was “the same, ” a fact irresistibly apparent on the face of his origin; secondly, the word “likeness” will bear the sense of generic identity.—(See Gen. 5:3.) Paul’s statement necessitates this view in the present case, for it must be evident that sin could not be “condemned in the flesh” if the flesh under the dominion of sin was not the subject of operation. Paul further says “Both he (Jesus) that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified, are all of one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren.”—(1 Heb. 1:22.) That this has reference to nature, is evident from the words immediately following: “Forasmuch, then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself took part of the same * * * He took not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abraham. Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren.”—(Heb. 2:17.)

The next thing to be considered is the principle or law necessitating that Christ should be a man, and under the curse. This principle is to be found in the fact that Jehovah is a great king, whose word stands fast and changes not. He is immutable in His plan of operation. All His ways are founded in wisdom, and they are never diverted from their course. In the development of these ways, the human race has come under condemnation of death, and the operation of these ways would hold them in condemnation, and destroy them for ever, no new circumstance intervening. Not only is the sentence of death hereditary, but every individual of the human race is a transgressor, and has been from the beginning; and, therefore, the law that “the wages of sin is death” has fatal hold of every soul. From a human point of view, salvation under such circumstances is an apparent impossibility. Because, if the law cannot be relaxed, and the law has its hold on us, how can we escape? The answer is to be found in the facts before us. In his kindness, God intends release for the captives, but not at the expense of His law; this must have its full course. How to allow the law its full course, and yet save those under it, is the problem solved in Christ. By the Spirit, God took hold of the condemned nature in begetting for himself a son in the flesh of Mary. The son so begotten was, “in all points,” like those he was manifested to save. He was of the same flesh and blood; was under the same condemnation, and exposed to the same temptations, but—thanks be to God!—through the power derived from his high origin, he was without sin, that is, he was not a transgressor. He was obedient in all things, even unto death, and when he died the death due to our common nature, he was not given over to its perpetual dominion, but was granted a glorious liberation from its bonds, and exaltation to a position of glory beyond the angels. The supremacy of God having thus been vindicated in the condemnation of sin in its own flesh, the Father transferred to the Son “power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life” to all who should make acknowledgment of their utterly lost position, by believing the truth concerning Christ, and taking his name upon them: the only means given under heaven whereby men can be saved. (Acts 4:14.) The result of the scheme is that no flesh can glory in the sight of God.

But take away the doctrine which John inculcated as a first principle, (that Jesus, in the days of his weakness, had come in the flesh, clothed with the condemned nature of our sinful race), and a foundation stone is loosed; the key-note is altered; the whole system assumes a different complexion. We are landed in the doctrine of vicarious suffering—that is, one being suffering for another, which is not a fact or a possibility in the divine dealings. The blood of bulls and goats could not take away sin, and the suffering of angels could not avail. Man must suffer his own penalty, and this he did in Christ, who was a man—“made of a woman, made under the law”—(Gal. 4:4, ) and therefore under the curse of the law which said, “cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.” The contrary doctrine lowers the majesty of God, in representing Him in the light of a compromiser. God will accept no recompence. “Substitution” is a myth of the apostacy. Death having passed on the race of Adam, he will not accept the death of angels or a new race in the place of what he has decreed. His law must be carried out, and the salvation there is to be, is on the strict basis of compliance with the requirements of his law in the first place. This has been secured by the manifestation of Christ in the flesh of sin.

The objections to these teachings of the word, are not founded in true reason. They have an appearance of force which disappears on a strict analysis. The fact, for instance, that Jesus is styled the “last Adam,” does not justify the conclusion that Christ was “as much a new beginning as the first Adam;” for this conclusion goes in direct opposition to the fact that Jesus was not created from the dust, but begotten of Mary. He is the last (or second) Adam in the sense of being the beginning and father of the new order of men shortly to appear on earth, and in the sense that he bears to them the same federal relation in the matter of life that the other does in death: but we must not ignore the process by which this glorious work is brought into accomplishment.

The idea that “he was of the same nature as Adam before his fall,” is equally untenable in the sense in which it is put forward. His nature was developed from Mary, and partook of the qualities of that nature. If, therefore, Christ “was of the same nature as Adam before his fall,” in the sense contended for by the friend whose objections have given rise to these remarks, so must Mary’s have been. The Roman Catholics themselves have seen the force of this, and have propounded the doctrine of “the immaculate conception,” and given us the absurd and blasphemous title “Holy Mary, mother of God!” They are logical enough, but their premisses are wrong: they make Christ “immaculate,” and therefore his mother; whereas the fact is that both were of the flesh of sin. The friend in question is bound to follow the Roman Catholics to the extent to which he affirms the immaculation of Christ.

But there is a misapprehension lurking under the proposition which we are combatting. Our friend imagines there was a change in the nature of Adam when he became disobedient. There is no evidence of this whatever, and the presumption and evidence are entirely the contrary way. There was a change in Adam’s relation to his maker, but not in the nature of his organization. What are the facts? He was formed from the dust a “living soul,” or natural body. His mental constitution gave him moral relation to God. He was given a law to observe: the law he disobeyed, and sentence was passed that he (the disobedient living soul) should return to mother earth. What was the difference between his position before disobedience and his position after? Simply this; that in the one case he was a living soul or natural body in probation for immortality; and in the other, he was a living soul or natural body under sentence of death. He was a living soul or natural body in both cases. The phrase “sin in the flesh” is metonymical. It is not expressive of a literal element or principle pervading the physical organization. Literally, sin is disobedience, or the act of rebellion. The impulses that lead to this, reside in the flesh, and therefore come to be called by the name of the act to which they give birth. In determining first principles, we must be accurate in our conceptions. The impulses that lead to sin existed in Adam before disobedience, as much as they did afterwards; else disobedience would not have occurred. These impulses are in their own place legitimate enough. We can judge of this matter by experience, because the human nature under discussion is the human nature we have upon ourselves and see in operation around us. There is no such thing as essential evil or sin. Evil and sin are relative terms. There is no propensity but subserves a good purpose in its own place. Sin is forbidden use; evil, interference with desired conditions as a punishment of sin, sometimes flowing out of sin itself. The difficulty is to keep the impulses in the legitimate channel. This difficulty is insuperable so far as perfect righteousness is concerned. A child comes into the world with impulses, but no knowledge or experience to guide the action of them. The result is that “folly is bound up in the heart of a child,” which the judicious administration of the rod will help to take out of him—(Prov. 22:15). For the same reason, “there liveth not a man that (at some time of his life or other) sinneth not.” The reason is to some extent applicable to Adam. He was in a state of innocency, or non-experience. Obedience seemed the natural thing till there was temptation. When good results were presented to the mind as the effect of disobedience, his want of experience left his mind a prey to the impulses excited by the prospect. Had he known experimentally that the path of disobedience was a path of thorns and death, he might have resisted the temptation.

When we come to the case of Jesus, we find a different state of facts, and at once perceive the part performed by the Spirit in his conception. Having God for his father, he was “holy.” He is so styled by the angel Gabriel in his message to Mary: “Therefore also shall that holy thing that shall be born of thee, be called the Son of God.” There are two senses in which he was so, (but neither exclude the fact, already established, that he was born a mortal descendant of Adam by Mary). He was separated, set apart, from his mother’s womb as an instrument of God, who, through him, was to compass the world’s redemption. In this sense, he was a “holy thing,” but he was holy in another sense. Having God for his father, he inherited a mental type in harmony with divine things, and a vital sympathy with the divine mind. We have only to look around us to see the proof of this. Children differ greatly in their latent capacities to apprehend moral and intellectual things, and this difference is invariably the result of a difference of parentage, either as to the individual or as to condition at the time of parentage. Take the child of an African and the child of an Englishman as tangible illustration of the first, and the child of chastity and the child of intemperance as an example of the latter. Now, Jesus was born of our species and one of our species, and subject to the laws which (in the divine arrangement) govern our species. When therefore, we realise the fact that divine power, (directly wielded by the Holy Spirit) was the energy which incepted his being, we are enabled to see that the type and texture of his being, though developed from the flesh of Mary, were something far above what fall to the lot of the mere children of men; and we shall find that this is one of the secrets of his sinlessness. It was the preparation of the suitable soil for the divine ideas to be implanted, which should germinate to such glorious results for this mighty globe which we inhabit. The soil prepared, the next stage was the sowing of the seed. The child “grew in wisdom and in stature.” He was in the hands of devout and God-fearing parents who walked in the ordinances of the Lord blameless. By them, in addition to the daily instruction commanded by the law, he was taken every year to Jerusalem to keep the feasts, by all of which means, he would acquire a knowledge of the past dealings of God with man, from the days of Adam onward, and being of so spiritual a constitution of mind, and “the grace of God being upon him” from his infancy, he would quickly apprehend the bearings of the whole matter, and become possessed, by knowledge, of that experience of the evil of sin which Adam lacked, and which, joined to his native tendency to divine things, would complete his qualification for succeeding where Adam failed. When at the age of thirty, the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form, and as it were, took possession of his being, the Father dwelt in him, and his qualification was complete. Yet he was tempted, because he possessed the impulses common to our nature. He possessed however, that counter-balancing endowment of knowledge and superior power which enabled him to do what no man ever has done, and that is to pass through this state of existence without sin. The common run of mankind inherit natures in which—through the prevalence of ignorance and the activity of disobedience in a long line of ancestry—the propensities are out of all proportion to the regulating faculties; and under the special disadvantage of being brought up in a state of society where ignorance of divine things, and consequent lawlessness, is the order of the day. No wonder that sin reigns, and that no man can offer to God a ransom for his brother. But thanks be to God for the glorious provision in Christ, by which we may escape the corruption which is in the world through lust, and enter, in due season, upon life eternal.

The Christadelphian, August 1869, Robert Roberts

(Answers to correspondence)

In What Sense was Christ Unclean?

R.P. wrote June 2nd, to call the Editor’s attention to “the physical aspect of sin.” He says,

“I do not believe that we really disagree on the point; but I think you were rather unguarded in your language in the Ambassador, in March last. Of course we all believe that Christ had no mental or moral sin; and if there is no physical principle, called sin, how was he subject to death? But we cannot separate the mental from the physical. The flesh thinks. The flesh, since the fall, is conceived and born in sin And its feelings and impulses are altogether those of a rebel. This is what works death in us—the physical principle, the law of our nature. The ‘mind which was in Christ Jesus,’ was not inherent in the substance which came from Mary. What was inherent in it was nothing but uncleanness. But his moral attributes were from without. He drank in overflowingly of his Father’s mind; and this became the predominating law within him, and so he triumphed.”

To this the Editor returned the following answer: “There is no substantial difference between us. Such as you feel to exist arises from a misconception, as I take it, on your part, of the constitution of human nature. Human nature is a bundle of faculties, each of which is good and legitimate in its own place. There is nothing unclean in itself; uncleanness is a relative idea. A faculty, impulse, or propensity going beyond the bounds prescribed by law, becomes the cause of disobedience, and disobedience is sin, and sin has brought death; that is, has evoked from divine power the purpose of dissolution in relation to the nature we bear. For purposes of description, sin is the cause, but literal definition would give God as the actual cause, because God causes the results of disobedience. Disobedience is the result of over-activity of desires which, in their own place, are good. This over-activity may be the result either of want of balance in the mental organization, or want of enlightenment in a good organization. The latter was Adam’s case; the latter and former combine in our case. We labour under the double disadvantage of ignorance and malformation of brain, that is, speaking generally of our inheritance by nature. Our cranial malformation is the result of the evil moral and physical conditions to which the race has been subject in a long line of sin-stricken generations. Doubtless, all the operations of our common nature have become deranged, the forces put out of balance, and the spirit or vital energy, generated by the blood, chemically vitiated. All this has resulted from Adam’s disobedience, since that was the cause of the evil circumstances that have existed in the world for six thousand years. This deranged condition of nature is, in us, the cause of sin, and, therefore, metonymically, may be expressed as sin, but, literally, and in itself, it is not sin: this derangement did not exist in Christ. The intervention of divine paternity rectified the disturbed conditions, else he, like us, would have been a sinner. Just as a cultivated European brain is capable of higher development than the Hottentot, though generically identical in nature, so the brain through which divine power and wisdom were manifested among men, was made capable of higher things than “mere man,” though generically the same. The “substance that came from Mary,” therefore, constituted the basis of “the mind that was in Christ,” holding to that mind the same relation that an undeveloped kernel does to the tree that is to result from its development. The kernel truly, requires air, sun and rain, to grow into a tree; but, nevertheless, it contains within itself the type and hidden invisible power of the tree that is to grow. So the ‘holy thing’ born of Mary, received the parental impress of Deity, by the Spirit, and therefore under the circumstances by which he was surrounded, he developed into a ‘man separate from sinners.’ I should therefore take exception to your proposition that nothing but uncleanness was inherent in the babe of Bethlehem. Legally, he was unclean; that is, he was under the condemnation of the law—God having laid upon him the iniquities of us all; but in his actual nature, he was the flesh and blood of Adam, ‘prepared’ by the Spirit for a Son-manifestation of the Eternal Father, that justification (by death and resurrection) might be developed for the sons of men. He was the condemned nature of man, in the hand of Almighty power, for the opening of a way of deliverance. That nature was historically a sinner, and under the dominion of sin, as regarded both moral condition and everlasting destiny. Therefore, it could be said that Jesus, though without sin, was ‘made sin.’ On the other hand, because the mortal nature he bore was a nature inheriting condemnation, that condemnation could come upon him (though himself sinless), without any violation of God’s methods in the case.

Apparent Contradictions Reconciled

Another, writing April 30th, remarks as follows:

“I have twice perused your article in the March Ambassador, on ‘the relation of Jesus to the law of sin and death,’ with very great interest, as it has assisted me in arriving at a clearer view of the subject. There is, however, to my mind, an apparent (I hope it is only apparent) contradiction in different parts of the article, which I cannot reconcile. On page 83 you say, ‘The sentence of death ran in the blood, which he inherited from Adam, through Mary.’ And a little farther down, on the same page—“It is testified that he was ‘made sin’ for us; as he was not of sinful character, this could only apply to his physical nature, which, ‘drawn from the veins of Mary, was made sin.’ But on page 85, you say, ‘Our friend imagines there was a change in the nature of Adam when he became disobedient.’ There is no evidence of this whatever, and the presumption and evidence are entirely the contrary way. There was a change in Adam’s relation to his Maker, but not in the nature of his organization Again, ‘It (sin in the flesh) is not expressive of a literal element or principle, pervading the physical organization.’

I fully agree with the last two quotations. I cannot agree with the proposition of some, that ‘sin is a physical principle.’ But the quotations I have given from page 83 seem to convey such an idea. Perhaps I may misunderstand your meaning, but certainly, the expressions you use, convey to my mind the idea of a physical principle pervading the organization; and I should be glad to receive an elucidation of the matter, as it is a subject on which it is so important to have right views”

To this the following answer was returned: “As to the apparent inconsistencies in the March article, they arise from the indispensable metonymy which appertains to all descriptions of the subject. My explanation is, first, as to ‘ran in the blood,’ ‘made sin,’ &c. Adam, before transgression, though a living soul (or natural body—1 Cor. 15:44–5), was not necessarily destined to die, as obedience would have ended in life immortal. After transgression, his relation to destiny was changed. Death (by sentence,) was constituted the inevitable upshot of his career. He was, therefore, in a new condition as regarded the future, though not in a new condition as regarded the actual state of his nature. In actual nature, he was a corruptible groundling before sentence, and a corruptible groundling after sentence; but there was this difference: before sentence, ultimate immortality was possible; after sentence, death was a certainty. This change in the destiny lying before him, was the result of sin. That is, his disobedience evoked from God a decree of ultimate dissolution. This was the sentence of death, which, though effecting no change as regarded his constitution at the moment it was pronounced, determined a great physical fact concerning his future experience, viz., that immortality, by change to spirit nature, was impossible, and decay and decease inevitable. The sentence of death, therefore, appertained to his physical nature, and was necessarily transmitted in his blood, to every being resulting from the propagation of his own species. This explains the first class of terms which seem to you to affirm sin to be a physical principle. The second class of expressions are, therefore, in harmony with the ideas embodied in the first; e.g., ‘there was a change in Adam’s relation to his maker (that is, in the purpose of God concerning the future of Adam’s experience: immortality being made impossible, and death inevitable); but not in the nature of his organization.’ Again, ‘it (sin in the flesh,) is not expressive of a literal element or principle pervading the physical organization,’ but of the impulses which lead to sin, and sin (in the results it evokes from the mind of God,) re-acts upon the flesh in bringing upon it a condition in which it is mortal, and physically impure.”

Editor.