Readings


EXODUS 34. 1-9

And Jehovah said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon the tables the words that were on the first tables, which thou brakest. And be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me on the top of the mount. And no man shall come up with thee; neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount; neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount. And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto mount Sinai, as Jehovah had commanded him, and took in his hand two tables of stone. And Jehovah descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of Jehovah. And Jehovah passed by before him, and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth; keeping loving kindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin; and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation. And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped. And he said, If now I have found favor in thy sight, O Lord, let the Lord, I pray thee, go in the midst of us; for it is a stiffnecked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance. 

John 9:24-41

So they called a second time the man that was blind, and said unto him, Give glory to God: we know that this man is a sinner. He therefore answered, Whether he is a sinner, I know not: one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see. They said therefore unto him, What did he to thee? How opened he thine eyes? He answered them, I told you even now, and ye did not hear; wherefore would ye hear it again? would ye also become his disciples? And they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God hath spoken unto Moses: but as for this man, we know not whence he is. The man answered and said unto them, Why, herein is the marvel, that ye know not whence he is, and yet he opened mine eyes. We know that God heareth not sinners: but if any man be a worshipper of God, and do his will, him he heareth. Since the world began it was never heard that any one opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out. Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and finding him, he said, Dost thou believe on the Son of God? He answered and said, And who is he, Lord, that I may believe on him? Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen him, and he it is that speaketh with thee. And he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshipped him. And Jesus said, For judgment came I into this world, that they that see not may see; and that they that see may become blind. Those of the Pharisees who were with him heard these things, and said unto him, Are we also blind? Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye would have no sin: but now ye say, We see: your sin remaineth.

Sermon

Growing up we all learn a variety of ways to adapt when our needs were not being met. This involves our physical needs and our emotional needs. Our need for attention and our need for love. Some of the strategies we develop probably worked well for us as children. As a baby in the crib, wanting attention, we found that a little fussing or crying would generally bring someone to change our diaper or feed us or pick us up and cuddle us for a while. As small children we began to observe the things other children did to get attention. Sometimes when we tried them they worked and sometimes they didn't work or may even had serious consequences for us. For example: we may have seen little Joey down the street throw a temper tantrum and get instant attention, so we tried it ourselves but were just ignored or maybe sent to our room.

Through trial and error we developed our own methods of getting what we want from the various people we associated with. All the while we were likely, unconsciously watching the way our parents interacted as well and we began to pick up some of their habits and tactics in dealing with others. Sometimes this learning was done on a negative basis in that we witnessed behaviors that we did not like or that we saw were not effective or had bad results, so we determined not do those things because they are hurtful or inadequate. Also, as we grew older we found that behaviors that worked in our family setting did not necessarily work with other people at school or out in the broader community. Perhaps in your family of origin you found that the best way to have your needs met was by being over-responsible, that is by jumping in and taking on responsibility for getting things done. But when you joined a local group and started jumping right in and taking over, then you suddenly found yourself being excluded or even shunned. Because this new family, the club, already had its established leaders and they feel threatened by this new energy that wanted to replace them, they protected their vested interests and you either had to back off and conform or get pushed out. 

All in all we learn an awful lot from our parents about how and how not to relate to other people. We obtain our basic set of values from them and we then carry them into our adult life. We have many parts to our character they include, among other things, our feeling part, our creative part, our nurturing part, and our spiritual part. In some families these basic parts of human character are not encouraged to develop. We may have been taught to suppress our desire to be artistic or to be nurturing because the head of the family did not believe these things were necessary or important. And so we would concede to the authority of the day because that was what was expected, or the consequences of not going along with it were going to be too severe. 

This brings us to the religious idea that we inherit the iniquity of our parents. Which seems to invalidate the idea that we have freedom of the will in all that we do. There are two ways to view this notion: one is that we inherit these sins or evils automatically at conception, and the second is that we inherit a tendency or weakness to certain kinds of evils which, if we are confronted with them we are predisposed to become involved in them. The idea that we are evil by nature or are born into sin is mentioned in several places in the Bible. In our reading from the Book of Exodus we find Moses preparing to go down mount Sinai to the people with a second set of tablets which contain the Ten Commandments. The Lord God repeats the same words he told him when he took the first set. "The Lord, the Lord a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers (parents) upon the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation." In the first instance he had added the statement "of those who reject me, but showing steadfast love to those who love me and keep my commandments." These words and the ideas they convey are used later on in the Old Testament where the notion that we are all born into sin is put forward, but the statement is generally not qualified so that it implies that all are sinful by birth and retain their sins throughout life. The Psalmist said, "Surely I have been a sinner from birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me." (Psalm.51.5) and also, "even from birth the wicked go astray, from the womb they are wayward and speak lies." (Psalm 58.3) From Lamentations, "Our fathers sinned and are no more, and we bear their punishment." (Lamentations 5-7). Ezekiel said. "The fathers eat sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge. (Ezekiel. 18.2) Isaiah said. "Prepare slaughter for his sons because of the guilt of their father." (Isaiah 14.21) Jeremiah said, "You show steadfast love to the thousandth generation but repay the guilt of parents into the laps of their children after them." (Jeremiah 32.18). In John 9 the Pharisees referred to this notion when they told the blind man Jesus had healed, that he had been born altogether in sin, even though Jesus had advised the people that in truth his being born blind had nothing to do with either his parents or himself having sinned.

The implication is that we inherit the sins and evils of our parents and of generations prior to them and that we are responsible for them and must bear the punishment for them. That seems rather unfair, doesn't it? But then we run across statements that seem to contradict this idea. They are very direct statements that imply that each person is responsible for their own sin. Ezekiel speaks at length about this. In Chapter 18 verse 19-20 he says that the word of the Lord came to him and said: "Yet you say, 'Why should not the son suffer for the iniquity of the father?' When the son has done what is lawful and right, and has been careful to observe all my statutes he shall surely live. The soul that sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.

The Arcana Coelestia states: "Each individual is born into the evils of self-love and love of the world inherited from parents. Every evil which has become habit or second nature, through habitual surrender to it, is transmitted to offspring, thus from one generation to the next by parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on going a long way back. The evil transmitted in this way becomes at length so great that the whole of a person's own life is nothing but evil. This chain of transmitted evil is not broken or altered except by the life of faith and charity received from the Lord. A person constantly leans towards and slips into what he has inherited. As a consequence he reinforces that evil residing with him, and also adds many more evils to it. These evils are completely contrary to spiritual life; they destroy it. Therefore unless a person receives spiritual life from the Lord by being conceived anew, born anew, and brought up anew, that is, created anew, he is damned. For nothing except what is of hell occupies his will and consequently his thinking. AC 8550-8552

This implies, in a broad sense, that evils can eventually affect whole societies of people because the chain has never been broken by some of them ceasing to do the evil and instead moving to a life of faith and charity and love toward the neighbor. This can be seen today in the families involved in organized crime and the groups who think their religious beliefs justify acts of hatred and terrorism toward others.

This is pretty heavy stuff and we wonder if there is any real hope that we should escape all this inherited evil. But the good news is that there is a solution and it is not such a difficult one. A life of faith and charity will remove us from the sins and evil of our past, regardless of whether it is inherited or developed on our own. 

We must strive to break away from bad habits. Evil ideas, attitudes and behaviors are passed on to us by experience and exposure to them; not through our genes. By the same token good ideas, attitudes and behaviors are passed on as well. As children we learn to adapt to these things and then as adults we readapt to doing them and form habits. Our freewill is still intact and we simply need to choose what is good over what is evil. We simply need to follow the Lord's teaching and example. 

Heed the word of the Lord: "The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself." Amen