Sin

I saw some children in a Christian compound in fear of their souls, all due to their sinfull nature. I thought that if innocents suffer so, their parents must be undergoing great torment. They must be going around like mediaeval penitentes, whipped from town to town for their sins. However, they were doing fine. Only the innocent suffered, which is - in this best of all worlds-the way it should be. It occurs to me that our understanding of sin is rather poor. Sin is not a singular event. It is a process of long duration. When we read: "...whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." we are not talking about standing around looking at the ladies. We are not talking about the sudden access of passion which occurs at the sight of something we would wish to love. The notion of looking on someone to lust after them is an expression which shows a resolve to set upon a course of action. The adultery is not done immediately. As I stand in rapt desire, the lady does not yield at once. I must set forth upon a campaign. I must also deceive those who already are within the ambit of my love. I must deceive my wife. I must become a faux-monnayeur des emotions ( sorry about that. the first person to whom I spoke these ideas was a Frenchy. also, apologies to Andre Gide.) I must become a counterfeiter of emotions. I must dissemble. I must deceive. I must plot. I need to lie to cover up the gaps of time spent in sinful pursuit. Then, after a time of preparation, my campaign is a success and then even greater are the calls upon deceit and lies and dissembling. This is not a single event. This is a commitment to a way of life at variance to godliness. This is a commitment to evil. The act of sin is merely an occurence of a measurable statistic; e.g., the adultery rate, the divorce rate, etc. Most of us dullards focus on the act of sin, ignoring the long history that preceeds it. A devotion to evil is still sin even though there has been no overt action which statisticians of morality may enter into their books of calculations. So Jesus is pointing to the sinfull nature of making up one's mind to pursue a course of action which is manifestly evil. You have sinned. The act may come about next year, but there's plenty of other evil to spread around until then. Do you feel the heat? (In this analysis, we see the importance of the personal history of the individual. Do we ascribe equal importance to the personal history of a society?)