@lakshmi,
I don’t doubt the statement (“Free will, however, has been defined by Christian teachers from the second century on”); however it does beg the question, what about ‘free will” in the previous 1500 years? Was it even a topic? I believe that this is best understood in how the “scriptures” dealt with what Western Christendom calls the “fall.” A few points to ponder:
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How often was the “fall” or original sin referred to in the OT?
Gerhard von Rad, observed this omission in the Old Testament: “The contents of Gen. ch. 2, and especially ch. 3 are conspicuously isolated in the Old Testament. No prophet, psalm, or narrator makes any recognizable reference to the story of the Fall.” Other important biblical scholars agree. The great biblical theologian Brevard S. Childs wrote: “It is striking that the ‘fall tradition’ plays virtually no role in the rest of the Hebrew Bible until it was revived in the Hellenistic period (e.g., IV Ezra).” More recently, the learned historian of biblical religion Ziony Zevit has offered a similar assessment: “What is not reflected in the Hebrew Bible and what was not known in ancient Israel was a Garden story that expressed the myth of a Fall.”
Smith, M. S. (2019). The Genesis of Good and Evil: The Fall(out) and Original Sin in the Bible (First edition, p. 15). Westminster John Knox Press.
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The use of the word inclination (yetser) in Genesis 6:5, 8:21, and Dt 31:21 could shed some light on this subject. From these verses, it certainly sounds like evil is part of being human, in my mind baked in.
This noun is often translated “inclination” or the like. While the translation “inclination” for yetser has become common, it is not quite right. The root of the noun, *ytsr, means more specifically to “fashion, form,” and it denotes what the human person “forms” or “designs.”
Smith, M. S. (2019). The Genesis of Good and Evil: The Fall(out) and Original Sin in the Bible (First edition, p. 76). Westminster John Knox Press.
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…in the Babylonian Talmud. In recounting the creation of humanity in Genesis 2, the Talmudic tractate Berakhot cites Rabbi Simeon ben Pazzi: “Woe is me, because of my Creator [yotsri]! Woe is me, because of my evil inclination [yitsri]!” The first sentence alludes to Genesis 2:7 and the second to Genesis 6:5 and 8:21. In the case of Genesis 2:7 and 6:5 and 8:21, the “design” or “inclination” of the human creature is tied to the divine creator of Genesis 2. Beyond recognizing the creator as the ultimate cause, the text does not explain this dimension of the human person.
Smith, M. S. (2019). The Genesis of Good and Evil: The Fall(out) and Original Sin in the Bible (First edition, p. 77). Westminster John Knox Press.
- If we jump to the NT James chapter 4, we see yester again.
The relationship between the way James speaks of desire and the Jewish concept of “yetser” is what makes these verses noteworthy. Yetser is a Hebrew word that typically refers to desire, longing or inclination. It comes from a Hebrew root meaning “to form inwardly” or “to fashion.” In Jewish thinking, every human person is born with a yetser, and the way that desire or inclination is shaped determines a person’s spiritual destiny. Shaping the inclinations—the yetser—toward God and His ways is choosing the way of wisdom and peace. Allowing the inclinations to be formed according to sinful desire is choosing the way of destruction and death.
Walters, J. M. (1997). James: a Bible commentary in the Wesleyan tradition (p. 159). Wesleyan Publishing House.
I have always thought that James was a very Jewish book; in some quarters, it is viewed as a book that stresses works over faith. I don’t believe that it is a stretch to say that James’ instruction on Grace does not differ much from what Saul would have preached (pre Damascus road), except that James believes in and invokes the name of Jesus.
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The single most revealing use of the term in the Old Testament is likely in Genesis, which gives God’s reason for the destruction of mankind by the flood: “Every inclination [yetser] of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time” (Gen. 6:5b). This suggests that while God has created us with a yetser, it is something that is “formed” or “takes its shape” from us—for example, by our thoughts or willful acts. To the rabbis, the yetser is God’s creation, but we are responsible for the evil it produces in us. Its activity leads to such sins as sexual lu$t and indiscretion, anger and greed, and results in what the rabbis termed, significantly, “double-heartedness,” surely akin to what James terms “double-mindedness.”
The important truth for our purposes is that the desire—the yetser—is clearly the responsibility and liability of the individual person. Many of the Old Testament usages of the word affirm this idea of intention and the human role in forming and shaping our inclinations. Psalm 103:14 demonstrates this in the psalmist’s note that God “knows how we are formed [yetser], he remembers that we are dust.”
Walters, J. M. (1997). James: a Bible commentary in the Wesleyan tradition (p. 160). Wesleyan Publishing House.
In short, I have wondered why we bookmark “the first sin” when the text would suggest otherwise by that I mean if we want to call it that the fall happened over a period of time. To be clear, I am not arguing for the idea that man can reconcile himself to God through any other means than the Cross and the finished work of the Messiah, Jesus.
I will stop here before turning this into a more confusing explanation than my previous post.