Theology Of Paul

THEOLOGY OF PAUL
M.M.NINAN
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human existence. ‘"I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children, yet your
desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."
The Hebrew word for man is iysh, for woman, ishah. The Talmud says that when iysh and ishah come
together, the letters overlap except for two -- y and ah. These spell the name of God. The union of
man and wife gives a foretaste of heaven which will remain in human existence until the time of
redemption when the whole cosmos will be reunited as one with God.
We in our individualistic world think of man as a separate free and independent soul who relates with each other
and reacts with the world around us. In this outlook we miss the fact that we are all bound together as one unity
along with the rest of the creation. Sin essentially is this mistake in our understanding of who we are in terms of
the cosmic realities. Man was transported from the divine realm into the realms below in order that the decay may
become active... However it was all within the plan.
Rom 8:20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in
hope;
Man is in the Bondage of Sin: Original Sin
At this time it will be necessary to explain what this bondage is. Was it not possible for God to condone what
Adam and Eve did and accept their apologies and would not everything be alright?
What happened at fall, that this was made impossible? We have seen the whole reality as a Purusha – the Cosmic
Person. What happened at the fall was an assertion of Man as independent being vying with other beings and
parts of the body of the Cosmic Person for status creating a selfish center. This is the same concept as Cancer in
human body. Consider a society where everyone is selfish as is today. Even a saintly person immersed into a
society based on selfishness will not be able to save the society. If one person who is selfish enters into a perfectly
harmonious society, he will ultimately destroy the whole system into a chaos. We have the history of the entry of
Ananias and Saphira in the early Jerusalem Church as an example. Every individual in an evil society is forced into
a mode of selfish state. Throughout the history of man such experiments were conducted and not one succeeded.
Every thought and every decision is based on “What is in it for me?” They form interest groups and power groups
to despoil others and gain advantage. This is the Bondage to sin. Certainly there remains within man the ability to
make decisions with a freedom which is inherent in the human soul. This interaction can go on but will never be
able to heal the whole rupture.
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