# Can someone help me out with Deut. 1:39-40



## FrozenChosen (Jun 21, 2004)

I'm using an NKJV and it says:

39 &quot;Moreover your [b:6b358f801a]little ones and your children[/b:6b358f801a], who you say will be victims, [b:6b358f801a]who today have no knowledge of good and evil[/b:6b358f801a], they shall go in there; to them I will give it, and they shall possess it. 40 But as for you, turn and take your journey into the wilderness by the Way of the Red Sea.' 

I'm confused as to how this text relates to the idea of original sin from birth. I've always been taught that from birth you are sinful, even if you are not aware of it. What is Moses, by the inspiration of God, trying to tell us?


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## Athaleyah (Jun 22, 2004)

I took that to mean that they were too young to be morally responsible for their actions. They were basically too young to understand the evil of what the adults had done. Though certainly they were under sin, like all humans.


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## Me Died Blue (Jun 22, 2004)

Angela, I'll admit I don't really know how to intepret the passage in Deuteronomy. However, your interpretation seems to contradict Psalm 58:3 (ESV), which says that &quot;The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray from birth, speaking lies.&quot;

In Christ,


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## Athaleyah (Jun 22, 2004)

I didn't phrase what I was thinking very well, and I still could be wrong, but I did not mean to imply that they were innocent of sin. Only perhaps not guilty of that particular sin god was condemning, by virtue of their youth. Like a woman carrying an infant along. Yes, the infant is sinful by nature, but it was not likely complaining about God's provision and being rebellious in the way that the adults were. I suppose I was taking &quot; who today have no knowledge of good and evil&quot; not as a general statement on the spiritual condition of youth, but as a qualifier of the youth present, to mean the very young who lacked either the ability or understanding to sin in the way the adults did, since a rebellion was the specific sin being punished. Yes, all are in rebellion against God, but I thought in this case, God was punishing a specific instance.

Still... if I'm wrong, at least I'm much more clear about it, now.


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## Contra_Mundum (Jun 22, 2004)

*Original Sin is one thing ...*

... actual sins are another. 
Rom. 5:14 &quot;Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam....&quot;
It is generally thought that this verse speaks to the fact that death reigns even over those who have not (yet) sinned intentionally and willfully as Adam did, i.e. infants. This is due 1) to the fact that the guilt of Adam's first sin has been federally imputed to them, and 2) they are &quot;bad seed&quot; meaning they are sinners (though they have not yet sinned willfully--because the inclinations, propensities, and urges to evil are all present, though in nacent form. Babies are not &quot;neutral&quot; when they are conceived &quot;in sin&quot; (Ps. 51:5). Moral responsibility occurs very, very, very early, the first time a child asserts its will against authority he understands he ought to obey.
But, there is a time when these little ones can be said &quot;not to know&quot; yet good and evil, the idea in Deut. 1 being that God acknowledged that the younger the members of the nation were, the less they had a share in the rebellion of their parents, and the youngest of all were practically innocent entirely of the affair. NOT [i:45906f7a5c]innocent[/i:45906f7a5c] in the absolute sense, but innocent of this rebellion. So, it was within the sphere of God's justice and mercy to permit them to live and see the Promised Land. Yes, even up to the age of 20 years (Num. 14:29) God would grant this mercy.


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## fredtgreco (Jun 22, 2004)

Original sin does not require knowledge of good an evil. It is imputed (Romans 5:12-21)


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## FrozenChosen (Jun 22, 2004)

Thanks Bruce and Fred, that helps me out.


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## The0 (Aug 30, 2004)

[quote:7a36221111="fredtgreco"]Original sin does not require knowledge of good an evil. It is imputed (Romans 5:12-21)[/quote:7a36221111]

For our parents, Adam and Eve, Original Sin was necessary to acquire the KNOWLEDGE of Good AND Evil. That was God's plan.


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## Contra_Mundum (Aug 31, 2004)

Roger, 
It is true that God's plan was perfectly carried out in the Garden. But you may be confusing the first sin and the Fall with the doctrine of Original Sin. Original Sin is a spiritual affliction that all Adam and Eve's children are born with. It is "the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of original righteousness, and the corruption of his whole nature... together with all actual transgressions which proceed from it" (WSC 18). 

But it's also false to think that the only way for Adam and Eve to know both good and evil was through an empirical test, and succumbing to sin. They could have attained a distinctly God-like knowledge of good and evil by using the Tree as it was meant to be used--which was clearly by [i:420c0c4dfe]not[/i:420c0c4dfe] eating of it (re. God's explicit command). 

God knows good [i:420c0c4dfe]and[/i:420c0c4dfe] evil, but not by his doing evil. Evil is anything that is opposed to him. Adam and Eve should have rationally comprehended (and emperically verified) that constant obedience to the will of God was the greatest good, and learned (and grown in appreciation) that everything that opposed God's will (or tempted against it) was evil by definition. The knowledge they attained in this manner would have been far more correlative to God's own knowledge of the same than any experience of sin could have produced.

The like is true with Jesus Christ. As God, he possessed all the infinite knowledge of Diety. As the Son he always obeyed the Father. As a man he was tempted in every way like as we are, yet without sin. He came face-to-face with evil in a way few of us will ever know it. And as the God-man he knew what spiritual depravity was--and that to an unimaginable intensity--when the Father "laid on him the iniquity of us all." And none of the knowledge he gained was [i:420c0c4dfe]experimentally,[/i:420c0c4dfe] as an actual sinner; but as the spotless Lamb he bore even the penalty of *shame for us.*


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