Posted on 05/13/2021 8:01:05 AM PDT by CharlesOConnell
Genesis 4:13 King James Bible (KJV) - And Cain said unto the LORD, My punishment is greater than I can bear.
Brenton Septuagint Translation - And Cain said to the Lord God, My crime is too great for me to be forgiven.
Many other versions give witness that Cain implicitly denied God's power to forgive his sin. This despair is identified by Augustine with the unforgivable sin, for final impenitence, unwillingness to ask God for pardon before entering eternity, can most strongly be traced to despair at God's ability to forgive any sin, hence, it is called unforgivable, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.
This is disruption of Jesus' desire for friendship with man stronger than death. It is said that many of his drops of sweaty blood in the garden were at the knowledge of the many, perhaps the most of men who will fail to accept his salvation of them. Many of their reasons, for no one does anything without one, are due to despair, disbelief at his friendship for us, ultimately traceable to Satan's deception in the garden "no, you will not die", calling God a liar when he had told our original parents that if they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would die. Satan, the liar and murderer from the beginning, deceived them that God who is truth himself was a liar. So, many who despair of Jesus' saving mercy, fail to trust him.
The sense of Cain's despair is missing from the authorized version.
Many other versions give witness that Cain implicitly denied God’s power to forgive his sin>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Well. Islam is the same. Forgiveness is optional. Allah is a wrathful god.Unlike Jehovah.
Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is attributing something done by the Holy Spirit to demons. That occurred when people claimed that Jesus’ miracles, done by the power of the Holy Spirit, were actions of demons.
Not completely.
“Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.”
Matthew 12:31-32, KJV
“Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme: But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation: Because they said, He hath an unclean spirit.”
Mark 3:28-30, KJV
And this is an important issue to consider as asking for forgiveness for a sin you do not wish to stop from doing and thus using God as an excuse for being allowed to continue it by God’s forgiveness is blasphemy. Blasphemy is defined, in a religious sense, as a great disrespect shown to God. So repentance is not intended for the purposely continued sinner. Eternal damnation is. Sins may be forgiven only if the sinner wishes to profess and discontinue the wrongdoing, not using God to excuse it and overlook it.
Wy69
Church age believers have the Holy Spirit sealed within, it’s impossible for us to commit this sin, consciously or unconsciously. For example, some Corinthians accused other believers of cursing Jesus while speaking in tongues, but Paul in effect told them it was impossible because of the Holy Spirit’s presence within them. (1 Cor. 12:3) The same would hold true for us.
For our age, the unforgivable sin is to reject the pardon Jesus purchased for us with His life. Doing so puts us outside of God’s forgiveness because the death of His Son is the only remedy He has provided for our sin problem.
Matt. 12:30-32 was directed toward the Pharisees who watched with their own eyes while Jesus performed miracles of various kinds. They refused to believe He was the Messiah their own scriptures had foretold so they attributed His miracles to the only other supernatural force they knew, the devil (Matt. 12:24). In other words, they didn’t do this out of ignorance but out of malicious intent.
When He took on human form, Jesus set aside His God-like power and performed His miracles through the power of the Holy Spirit, so these Pharisees were blaspheming the Holy Spirit. By saying they would not be forgiven in this age or the age to come Jesus was saying that by their deliberate unbelief they had sealed their eternal destiny.
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No and no, being a wrong translation and isolationist eisegesis. First the interpretation of the Brenton Septuagint Translation is an outlier and contrary to the context, which has to do with punishment being one that Cain feared would result in his death, which God made to be a capital crime. And sin, though forgiven, has consequences and can result in a definite chastisement from God in this life and suffering the loss of rewards in the next . at the judgment seat of Christ (and implicitly His grievous displeasure, yet who will wipe away every tear). A pastor who commits adultery can be forgiven, but not only lose his ministry but be chastised to correct his character and to make others see how seriously God takes this. Thus Cain was not saying there was no forgiveness for his sin but was asking for mercy regarding his chastisement.
Secondly, while dying in unbelief in Christ is the sin that precludes forgiveness - not because God cannot forgive unbelief but because one does not come to God for it - in context that is not the sin the Lord is referring that cannot be forgiven.
Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David? But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils. And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand: And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand? (Matthew 12:22-26)
...Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come. (Matthew 12:31-32)
Here the sin referred to was that of attributing miracles that were manifestly of God to the power of the devil, which was a result of their continued hardness of impenitent heart even in the face of profound Scriptural and supernatural substantiation of the Son of God in word and in power. Thus unpardonable sin was not that protesting the degree of chastisement or doubting the forgiveness of God, but of final apostasy in resisting the Holy Spirit, and thus become reprobate and unable to repent, the "great transgression," having "wickedly departed" from God (Psalms 18:21) which David said he did not do.
This is what Hebrew 6 refers to,
For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. (Hebrews 6:4-6; cf. Gal. 5:1-4; Heb. 3:12; 10:25-39)
Did Cain repent ? Regardless of translation being promoted ... Well, that is between the Heavenly Father and Cain...
The unpardonable sin is a specific sin that only a few will ever be in a position to commit .. regardless of translation or some preacher/priests commentary. The unpardonable ‘sin’ is also a time signature yet to be fulfilled.
One slight error:
The record shows that GOD did NOT tell 'our parents'.
HE only 'told' Adam...
Genesis 2:15-18
15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
Nothing was recorded telling where Eve learned about the tree, in the middle of the garden.
Agreed...most people miss that part of the story. There is also the “sin unto death” but I don’t think that is the “unforgiveable sin”. Annanias and Saphira lied to the apostles and the holy Ghost about what they sold their property for and thus died but I don’t know that their souls were damned forever for it. Paul spoke of judging a sinning member...”releasing him to Satan for the destruction of his body so that his spirit could be saved in the day of resurrection.”
No Jesus seems to be saying that it is possible to so grieve the Spirit of God by those saying his acts of mercy were of the enemy, that persons may never be able to find forgiveness and peace with God. That is a horrible state to be in. I hope, when Jesus uttered this warning against blasphemy against the Holy Ghost,that many of the hearers took it to heart and that the Spirit regarded the episode as a lapse of judgment, a bit of brain flatulence for their sake. Jesus issued the warning of what would happen if they continued, he didn’t say they had all reached that place yet. “If you don’t believe in me, at least I would have you believe that the miracles were of God...any sort of blasphemy against the Son and the Father can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven” He said this because they accused him of performing miracles by the power of Satan. That was Jesus view of the “unforgiveable” sin.
Technically though some argue that to deny Jesus’ salvation and forgiveness and to die in an unsaved state is the “unforgiveable” sin but I think that is a technical error. Up to the point of death a man’s sins can be forgiven except for the Holy Ghost blasphemy, yet even that level can only be determined by the Spirit just how far a person went before the aggrieved Spirit sadly goes away. If some of the “near death” experience accounts of some Christians are to be believed, some were nearly dead and on the brink of hell when they cried out to Christ and he saved them right at the brink...their changed lives after recovery being a testimonial proof of having been saved “by the skin of their teeth”.
Certainly the Bible says a person may be woo’d by the spirit and for some, if they resist the Spirit, the Spirit will cease to strive with such a person at some point; in which case such a person may never know salvation,with their consciences seared to imperviousness to the effects of love and mercy.
But that is not the “blasphemy of the Holy Spirit which is the unforgiveable sin” that Jesus was talking about.
Technically the Bible doesn’t say if God did or didn’t tell Eden in conversations not recorded. We don’t know. When being tempted by the serpent, she certainly knew about the Tree and the ramifications of eating from it. So Eve heard it from someone, either God or Adam.
She did add the phrase “neither shall ye touch it lest ye die” which some have suggested was a corruption of God’s literal command to Adam to merely “not eat of the tree”, which may show humanity’s tendency to over think and add extra prohibitions than what are needed to sensibly and faithfully follow Godly laws.
I don’t know; we only know God told Adam “not to eat of the tree” and somehow Eve knew that she wasn’t supposed to eat of tree. How she came to add the phrase “neither shall ye touch it lest ye die” is a back story we can only speculate about.
“Church age believers have the Holy Spirit sealed within, it’s impossible for us to commit this sin, consciously or unconsciously.”
That depends on one’s views on “eternal security”. I think Hebrews 6 makes it clear a believer CAN choose to reject God and salvation:
“4 For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt. 7 For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. 8 But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned.”
That looks like it is written specifically to show believers CAN fall away. Maybe not often, but I knew a guy who sure SEEMED like a Christian who then utterly rejected Jesus.
God alone knows a man’s heart. We don’t even truly know our own. I prefer to trust in eternal security while acting as if it doesn’t exist.
Yet the Bible tells us eve was received by satan. Adam was not and willfully sinned
It was written to Jews who had converted to Christianity and were under intense pressure to go back under the Law. Everything in the letter has to be read from that perspective.
Those who relied on the daily sacrifice instead of invoking 1 John 1:9 (confessing directly to God) were in effect crucifying the Lord all over again, since He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The daily sacrifice was a foreshadowing of Him, and when He came the shadow gave way to the reality. The old way was no longer sufficient to restore them to fellowship (Hebr. 10:1-18).
“Those who relied on the daily sacrifice instead of invoking 1 John 1:9 (confessing directly to God) were in effect crucifying the Lord all over again...”
There is no hint in the letter that he is discussing people currently offering blood sacrifices while calling themselves Christians. He points out the superiority of Christ to Old Testament law, but ANYONE trusting in animal sacrifice INSTEAD of Christ would have been condemned outright and vehemently.
“It was written to Jews who had converted to Christianity and were under intense pressure to go back under the Law.”
If they went back under the Law after having converted, then they would be doing what you say is impossible. They would have been converts who then rejected Jesus Christ, and your argument is that NO CHRISTIAN CAN EVER DO SO.
Hence the name of the letter Hebrews?
Hebrews 3
9 Where your fathers tried Me by testing Me, And saw My works for forty years.
10 “Therefore I was angry with this generation, And said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, And they did not know My ways’;
11 As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’”
There were no Gentiles among whom he was speaking to.
All through Hebrews the topics are of the LAW, yearly sacrifices, daily sacrifices and Moses. Of which no Gentile would understand any of it.
Eve did it because she became convinced she could be like the Gods if she went along with Satan’s “pitch and woo”. Genesis provides no clarity as to why Adam ate the fruit provided by Eve but it is clear that God held them both responsible for eating of the Tree willfully. Adam was forced to work the ground which would not provide it’s full strength and both persons would die. Eve would experience multiplied sorrows with labor and child rearing and would be much more bound to Adam’s authority with the patterns repeated in subsequent generations. God cursed the serpent of course which most scholars think was a Satan infested creature.
I know there a lots of sermons about the delineations of sin and responsibility for the deed but both ate the fruit knowingly and perhaps for different reasons but many such sermons about the Edenic catastrophe are speculative. I’m not saying that none of those sermons have any value but i will say the best ones use a expository cross referencing biblical approach to further explain what happened in the garden.
Then there are those “thorns in the flesh”, those ‘messengers of Satan, that don’t get taken out immediately requiring the daily sufficiency of Christ’s grace. I’m sure Paul wasn’t the only Christian to ever have one.
It was TO Hebrews, discussing how superior what Christ offers is to anything the Jewish religion provided. Its constant theme is the superiority of Jesus.
But if JEWISH Christians can fall away, then GENTILE Christians can. You cannot have it both ways. You cannot claim the warnings of chapter 6 are irrelevant to us because they only apply to Jews - because there is neither Gentile nor Jew in Christ.
And consider Romans 11:
“22 Notice how God is both kind and severe. He is severe toward those who disobeyed, but kind to you if you continue to trust in his kindness. But if you stop trusting, you also will be cut off. 23 And if the people of Israel turn from their unbelief, they will be grafted in again, for God has the power to graft them back into the tree. 24 You, by nature, were a branch cut from a wild olive tree. So if God was willing to do something contrary to nature by grafting you into his cultivated tree, he will be far more eager to graft the original branches back into the tree where they belong.”
Jew or Gentile doesn’t matter. Hebrews was written to Jews, but is not LIMITED to them. Nor do the rules of salvation change for Jews versus Gentiles. If Jews who have come to Jesus can turn back, so can Gentiles!
in the middle of the garden.
So theologians, why are they in the center of the garden, side by side?
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