The Christadelphian February 1958, John Carter

“Words and Meanings”

Words are the instruments of thought and should be so used that they convey as simply and clearly as possible the writer’s meaning. There are two sources from which failure may arise: the writer may not use the best words or he may use some which have a particular meaning for himself which is not the usually understood meaning; or the reader may come to the words with his own understanding of their meaning and so read his ideas into them. There are accidental misuse of words, or some failure in clarity, where we should not make a man an offender for a word. One need only study a book like Fowler’s English Usage to realize the pitfalls in using one’s mother tongue.

It is easy to get into the way of using clichés, hackneyed phrases, slogans, which are often but slovenly ways of avoiding careful thinking. In this as a community we are not free from blame. Each controversy seems to develop a terminology of its own, and words are bandied about without regard to meaning. What, for example, does the phrase “clean flesh” mean? It depends whether it is used by a gymnasium master, a doctor, or a theologian: and the latter would find it understood in many senses. There are other words and phrases such as “constitutional sinner”, “sinner in Adam”, “condemnation”—“racial” and “adamic”. Our literature has its share of such words. They have stood for something by the first user, but it would appear that they have also more than once stood for something else to later readers, unaware of the background when first used.

In the interests of truth we need to define our terms and avoid ambiguous words. To commend the point we wish to make we quote from bro. Roberts in 1894: “Most controversies originate in the use of terms that are elastic from their vagueness. There are terms that are suitable enough as the casual description of some passing phase of truth, but which become sources of confusion when used as a precise and leading term of definition. Technicalities, also, that are serviceable enough when they represent an understood and accepted meaning, become causes of mere bewilderment if used for demonstration in controversy. In all controversy, ideas ought to be expressed in the language of literal precision. When they cannot be so expressed in a case of dispute, and when, instead of literal definition, technicalities are pressed forward in the argument, it is the indication of a mental vacuum in that case, and a cause of mere jangle to disputants . . . The mind is wearied and distressed by a mechanical use of Bible terms. The mind cannot be satisfied with words when they fail to convey ideas.”

As far back as 1876 ambiguous phrases caused difficulties and bro. Roberts wrote: “He (Jesus) was a sufferer from the effects of sin in all the items of weakness, labour, pain, sorrow, death; and in this sense (as a partaker with us of the effects of sin) has been described as a ‘constitutional sinner’, or one subject to the sin-constitution of things. But as this phrase gives occasion to disingenuous cavil, it is well to discard the phrase and look at the meaning which has been stated.” (Christadelphian, 1875, p. 375.)

Not many years ago we took part in a conversation where a few brethren were present. The nature of Christ was being discussed, and we reminded the brethren that if we would fully see Jesus we must remember that besides being of our nature he was sinless. We were at once informed that Jesus was not sinless, and in answer to a surprised enquiry, What do you mean? was told that he was not sinless since he had “sin in the flesh”. The brother on investigation believed that Jesus had done no sin, but it took quite a time to establish in the minds of those present that the word “sinless” applied to character. We might as a parallel case ask what “sinful” means, and whether in using the phrase “sinful flesh” some are not attaching to the words a meaning they do not really bear. Is it the strict antonym of “sinless”?

The phrase “sin in the flesh” has been sadly wrenched from its context and been made to do duty for several ideas. Like the words “sinful flesh” it occurs but once in the Scriptures (Romans 8:3) and then in a context where correct translation is important. To get the precise thought of Paul we must remember he wrote “flesh of sin” or “sin’s flesh”. We are being censured by a “minority” critic for something written recently on this verse. We will therefore quote some words of bro. C. C. Walker which in our judgment give the correct approach. We reproduce them in the hope that the brethren who are standing aside will weigh them well, for they are in danger of being led back to the false theories promulgated sixty years ago. Bro. C. C. Walker was answering an enquirer in 1929, and said: “It so happens that we have written upon this subject in an article on The Atonement, the first portion of which appears in this issue. Rom. 8:3 is a difficult passage to understand, and the words ‘sin in the flesh’ do not, in our judgment, constitute a ‘term’ in the passage, either in the logical or grammatical sense. The main grammatical ‘terms’ in the case—the subject and predicate—stripped of all adjuncts are these: ‘God condemned.’ Sin is the object of condemnation. Write it with a capital to harmonize with the figure of personification that runs through the whole of Paul’s argument here, and to harmonize also with the doctrine of Jesus Christ concerning the ‘casting out’, ‘judgment’, or condemnation, of ‘the Prince of this World’ which is Sin (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). This he enunciated when he was about to offer the sacrifice for sin of which Paul is speaking in Romans 8 . . . The words ‘in the flesh’ are the extension of the predicate, the focus of the ‘casting out,’ ‘judgment’ or ‘condemnation’.”

This answer we ourselves endorse as a definition of the “logical and grammatical” sense of the verse. We must correctly analyze a sentence to understand its meaning. The essential statement is “God condemned Sin” and if we ask where did the condemnation take place, the answer is “in the flesh”—the flesh concerned being the flesh of Jesus. We have just re-read what we wrote nearly thirty years ago in The Letter to the Romans. We have nothing to change: we might today expand some of the thoughts. The literal facts behind Paul’s words are that Jesus never yielded to any impulse to disobey God; he was always obedient; whereas all others had become servants to the flesh he was servant to God. Sin had been obeyed by all others, but Sin could establish no claim over Jesus. He shared our mortality and our temptations; he inherited the effects of sin in Eden at the beginning of the race as we all do. In the first Adam Sin triumphed; in the last Adam it was vanquished and in Paul’s powerful statement God “condemned Sin”, and at the same time justified Jesus.

On another page we reprint an extract from bro. C. C. Walker’s article on “The Atonement”. The whole of it is reprinted in the book Witness for Christ.