Sinfulness refers to the quality or state of being sinful. It means behaving in ways that are against moral principles or religious teachings, doing wrong or harmful actions that are considered to be morally unacceptable.
Full definition
Fundamentalism builds on this foundation: since all are sinners, the precise degree of
sinfulness of the individual is unimportant.
Such a rejection is not uncommon in modern theology, but it overlooks the significance of
human sinfulness as responsible action, an action that even God takes seriously.
If Israel read the shame of her
own sinfulness in the sins of Jacob, she also understood that the divine promise to Jacob was the promise of Yahweh to Israel.
In the language of The Concept of Anxiety, she only sees the «quantitative determinations» of
sinfulness in human history, without seeing the «qualitative leap into sin,» which is human evasion of God in the present moment in time.
The central issue in the early debates between Fundamentalists and Modernists was on the question whether the gospel should emphasize as the essence of the gospel, deliverance of the humans
from sinfulness or affirmation of the human vocation to creativity and cooperation with God in recreating nature and society according to the purpose of God.
All such theories grapple with the fact of human
sinfulness as the primary, disruptive element in the relationship between us and God.
It is not
sinfulness which establishes Christ's solidarity with us, but rather His voluntary acceptance of suffering, taking the consequences of sin on our behalf, out of love.
Such an observation is typically countered by the claim that rather than excluding and separating from their brothers and sisters, these believers are simply addressing the overt and insufficiently
acknowledged sinfulness of the church.
Unless a person is convicted of their heinous
sinfulness before a the Holy Majesty of God there is no hope.
When Milton's archangel Michael begins his prophetic story of the future of mankind his preface is: «Good with bad expect to hear, supernal grace contending
with sinfulness of Man.
According to the prevailing patristic exegesis of that passage, then, it is this universal mortality that makes
personal sinfulness inevitable.
The continual unmasking of human
sinfulness does nothing to enhance our respect for an underlying goodness in human nature; rather it panders to our own deep inadequacies.
But if that is true, if the flood was a natural consequence of human rebellion and
sinfulness so that humanity separated themselves from God's protective hand thus inviting destruction upon their own heads, then how is it that in Genesis 8:21, God can now promise to stop the same sort of destruction in the future?
Through sacramental baptism and faith we enter Christ, and in Christ we can do works of righteousness and love despite our
natural sinfulness which we have inherited from Adam.
The illusion that the now is either so insignificant and commonplace as to be unworthy of study, or that it is so well known anyhow — without analysis, critical reflection, or even systematic observation — as to be beneath serious notice, has become all too characteristic of a theological tradition that knows perfectly well that we can not understand either God's grace or man's
sinfulness without in some fundamental sense understanding the other first.
She further argues that the fact of human
sinfulness makes it necessary to have coercive measures at national and international level to prevent tax evasion and restrain tax avoidance.
Even though Brunner and Barth both recognize that man's existence as man is made possible only through the I - Thou relation, they both emphasize the limitations that man's
sinfulness places upon his ability to enter into this relationship.
Talk about
inherited sinfulness or original sin can be very misleading, especially when it is interpreted almost exclusively in a biological fashion.
«The Pardoner, a seller of indulgences, is a complete and shameless rogue; but Chaucer, not content with exposing his impudence, shows how good he was at his job and how powerfully he preached
against sinfulness.
When we measure the best of men by Christ's standard, then, not even to mention the full, gross,
common sinfulness of man generally, how can we claim even for a moment that man is basically good?
The Protestant will regard specific norms, in the moral sphere, even in the form in which they appear in scripture, rather as a sort of sign - post pointing out the way to meet and endure the ever new situations of the personal life of faith, with a critical attitude towards oneself and one's
hidden sinfulness.
Since this unconditioned love is impossible of practice in a world where
unredeemed sinfulness must be considered the general characteristic, common civil society and its individual members as well as institutions like the family, the economic order, nationality and the state necessary for the preservation of humanity are to be ordered according to the moral law inherent in their nature.
Group confession of
general sinfulness lacks the edge that confession of specific sins offers.
As we shall see, the wisdom, which shines through this liturgical text, beneficially emphasises clerical
sinfulness within the context of the ecclesial community of faith.
The preacher's task is to show that this is
what sinfulness is really about; and then he or she is to go on to indicate that concrete actions, words, or thoughts which are inhuman, negate right movement toward fulfillment, and damage other persons and society.
The truth at the end of the day is that only Christ demonstrated his love for mankind and could redeem men from
eternal sinfulness.
Most Christians (and religious people in general) seem to believe that
sinfulness wins.
This may provide a clue for a way forward: Scripture teaches that all people have some knowledge of a Supreme Being in their reading of nature and in the testimony of their own hearts, however much such knowledge may have been distorted by individual and
corporate sinfulness (Rm.
To know God as governor is to understand that human
sinfulness disfigures the world and requires restraining influences.
From this
intrinsic sinfulness we can only get set free through faith and sacramental baptism (sacramental baptism is the rebirth).
There comes a point in time in God's dealing with men and nations when He abandons them so that they may reap the unintended consequences that their own
sinfulness produces.
The former stresses man's dignity and greatness as the child of God made in the divine image while the latter stresses man's
perpetual sinfulness and weakness.
Sinfulness proceeds only from the creature and not from God who being most holy and righteous neither can be the author and approver of sin, but all that God decrees and all that God providentially brings to pass is all to the praise of His glory.»
Phrases with «sinfulness»