The Protestant Churches at the time of the Reformation did not attempt to determine the nature of sin philosophically. They regarded it neither as a necessary limitation; not as a negation of being; nor as the indispensable condition of virtue; nor as having its seat in man’s sensuous nature; nor as consisting in selfishness alone; nor as being, like pain, a mere state of consciousness, and not an evil in the sight of God. Founding their doctrine on their moral and religious consciousness and upon the Word of God, they declared sin to be the transgression of, or want of conformity to the divine law. In this definition all classes of theologians, Lutheran and Reformed, agree. According to Melancthon, “Peccatum recte definitur ἀνομία, seu discrepantia a lege Dei, h. e., defectus naturæ et actionum pugnans cum lege Dei, easdemque ex ordine justitiæ divinæ ad pœnam obligans.” Gerhard says:1 “Peccatum” seu “ἀνομία” est “aberratio a lege, sive non congruentia cum lege, sive ea in ipsa natura hærat, sive in dictis, factis ac concupiscentiæ motibus, inveniatur.” Baier says:2 “Carentia conformitatis cum lege.” Vitringa says:3 “Forma peccati est disconvenientia actus habitus, aut status hominis cum divina lege.”
It is included in these definitions, (1.) That sin is a specific evil, differing from all other forms of evil. (2.) That sin stands related to law. The two are correlative, so that where there is no law, there can be no sin. (3.) That the law to which sin is thus related, is not merely the law of reason, or of conscience, or of expediency, but the law of God. (4.) That sin consists essentially in the want of conformity on the part of a rational creature, to the nature or law of God. (5.) That it includes guilt and moral pollution.
Sin is a Specific Evil.
Sin is a specific evil. This we know from our own consciousness. None but a sentient being can know what feeling is. We can neither determine à priori what the nature of a sensation is, nor can we convey the idea to any one destitute of the organs of sense. Unless we had felt pain or pleasure, we should not be able to understand what those words mean. If born blind, we cannot know light. If born deaf, we can have no idea of what hearing is. None but a rational creature can know what is meant by folly. Only creatures with an æsthetic nature can have the perception of beauty or of deformity. In like manner only moral beings can know what sin or holiness is. Knowledge in all these cases is given immediately in the consciousness. It would be in vain to attempt to determine à priori, what pain, pleasure, sight, and hearing are; much less to prove that there are no such sensations; or that they do not differ from each other and from every other form of our experience. Every man in virtue of his being a moral creature, and because he is a sinner, has therefore in his own consciousness the knowledge of sin, he knows that when he is not what he ought to be, when he does what he ought not to do, or omits what he ought to do, he is chargeable with sin. He knows that sin is not simply limitation of his nature; not merely a subjective state of his own mind, having no character in the sight of God; that it is not only something which is unwise, or derogatory to his own dignity; or simply inexpedient because hurtful to his own interests, or injurious to the welfare of others. He knows that it has a specific character of its own, and that it includes both guilt and pollution.
Sin has Relation to Law.
A second truth included in our consciousness of sin is, that it has relation to law. As moral and rational beings we are of necessity subject to the law of right. This is included in the consciousness of obligation. The word ought would otherwise have no meaning. To say we ought, is to say we are bound; that we are under authority of some kind. The word law, in relation to moral and religious subjects, is used in two senses. First, it sometimes means a controlling power, as when the Apostle says that he had a law in his members warring against the law of his mind. Secondly, it means, that which binds, a command of one in authority. This is the common sense of the term in the New Testament. As the rule which binds the conscience of men, and prescribes what they are to do and not to do, has been variously revealed in the constitution of our nature, in the Decalogue, in the Mosaic institutions, and in the whole Scriptures, the word is sometimes used in a sense to include all these forms of revelation; sometimes in reference exclusively to one of them, and sometimes exclusively in reference to another. In all cases the general idea is retained. The law is that which binds the conscience.