Human Nature In Its Second Estate

The Fall of Man

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Doctrinal Studies

Lesson: 2-11

Genre: Speech

Track: 11

Dictation Name: RR131F11

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s - 1970’s

[Dr. Rushdoony] Our Scripture is Genesis 3:1-6. The fall of man. Genesis 3:1-6.

Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

There is, according to Scripture, a fourfold estate of man. This is important for us to realize as we deal with the question of what is man? A biblical psychology of man. Man from his creation to his eternal state passes through four conditions. One of these is not ours, the state of innocence, which was the condition of mankind in the Garden of Eden. With the Fall came the state of depravity, which is the inheritance of all the sons of Adam, of all humanity. Then comes with our redemption the state of grace, and with our death and our entrance into heaven and with the end of the world and the new creation the state of glory. This is the fourfold state of man, innocence, depravity, grace and glory. We have seen in past weeks something of the implications of the image of God in man as it was ordained to be in the state of innocence. Its implications also throughout every condition of man. Now we turn more specifically to the state of depravity. Later on we shall deal with the estate of grace and then of glory.

The state of depravity or the doctrine of total depravity is a much misunderstood doctrine. Very commonly people will insist that it cannot be true because they’ve know some very evil men who at time been very clearly capable of doing good. The answer to that is of course, the older theologians, Calvin among them, when they discuss the doctrine of total depravity, also called attention to the frequent acts of goodness on the part of reprobate men. The doctrine of total depravity does not mean that the fallen man cannot show, from time to time, sometimes often, very genuine goodness. What it does mean is that the infection of depravity is total. That is, every aspect of man is corrupted and governed by the Fall. By the false religious principle of the Fall wherein man makes himself his own god. Therefore whatever good man commits as a sinner is set in the context of that false religious principle. And therefore it is not goodness in the sight of God. That false religious principle was stated by the Tempter in the Garden. It has several premises, which are basic to original sin, basic to the nature and psychology of man in the state of depravity. It is important for us to understand what those premises are. First of all, the Tempter said ye shall not surely die. You may possibly die. It’s quite likely that you will, this is a risk, a gamble you’re taking. But the Tempter’s statement was, ye shall not surely, infallibly, inescapably, die.

We are told in Scripture that the devil’s believe in God and tremble. They’re aware of His existence and power. But they are Armenian in their theology. That is, they deny the absolute sovereignty of God. What Satan was saying when he said ye shall not surely die is that God does not absolutely govern and predestinate man and all reality. Therefore he cannot, with absolute certainty, predict consequences. You may die, but ye shall not surely die.

Now we are told by St. Paul that whom God did foreknow he did predestinate. The Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 declared that known unto God were all His works from the foundation of the world. Our Lord affirmed the doctrine of predestination to the point where He said the very hairs of your head were all numbered. God’s foreknowledge and predestination are that total. Not a sparrow falls apart from your Father in Heaven. Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you. Throughout Scripture the absolute sovereign, predestinating power of God is affirmed. But according to Satan, God cannot predict our Fall and our death, He cannot predict the future, He is very powerful but He is not absolutely sovereign. Man lives in an open universe. It is open to experiment, to development, to change. Therefore ye shall not surely die. There is a chance, if we assert ourselves against this tyrant, of putting an opening wedge of freedom into the universe. Of creating an open universe, one in which man can develop his own potentialities, his own absoluteness.

Then second the premise, the Tempter’s position was the way to freedom is to break God’s law. Obedience to God in enslavement. Disobedience is liberation. Let’s have a liberation movement here in the Garden of Eden.

Not just a woman’s lib or a man’s lib movement, a liberation movement for humanity. And I summon you, who are the slaves of God, to freedom, which means to abandon God’s law. God is powerful, He is a threat. But, ye shall not surely die. We can create a wedge here, we can develop our own potentialities. We can assert our own ultimacy as against God, and little by little overthrow His tyranny, and the way to do it is to violate His law. Yea hath God said? Break God’s law. This is the way to liberation. And third, liberation means that ye shall be as gods, every man his own god. Now if man is his own god he cannot bow down to other gods, he must assert his own godhood. This means waging war against God. Two mutually exclusive claims cannot be tolerated. One of the gods must go. And of course the implication for this position is an obvious one. Eliminate God and then you have all the other gods, other men. This is why John Paul Sartre, the most influential philosopher of this century, the existentialist, in asserting that man must become his own god, has said, for me my neighbor is the devil. If I am god and he is claiming to be god, one of us has to go. And today, with the new left, disciples of Sartre naturally, their hand is raised against every man. And what they posit is ultimate panarchy. A world which having set aside God then proceeds to kill itself off. Every man his own god.

There’s a fourth premise in the Tempter’s offer. Ye shall be as gods, knowing, that is determining for yourself, what constitutes good and evil. Man can live beyond God’s good and evil. Why should man bow down to the absolutes of God? In this liberation movement for humanity we will affirm that we can decide what is right and wrong in terms of how it affects us. Does it please me? Then it is good. Does it displease me? Then it is evil. Thus good and evil are essentially relative to man. Not absolute over man. There is no element of transcendence. There is no moral necessity which binds man to man. This is what original sin means. It is the liberation movement offered by Satan to humanity. Its charter of independence, god. And yet this self-styled god, after making his religious stand, when confronted by God as to why he has done this thing, he blames the environment. Adam’s plea, the woman Thou gavest me, it was Your fault God, she did give me and I did eat. I’m the victim. And the woman, the serpent did give me and I did eat. Environmentalism, pure and simple. Environmentalism goes hand in hand with humanism. And with humanisms claim to be god. Now here is a contradiction. On the one hand, humanism, man’s total depravity, man’s sin, leads to an assertion by man that he is god and on the other hand, to the claim that, well, the environment is responsible. The two seem at first glance to be contradictory. But what is their rationale, what is behind this dual claim?

To understand the significance of it, let us examine an advertisement which appeared in the past couple of months for a pornographic book. The book, a particularly obscene thing, was aimed at a male audience. And the whole purpose of the book apparently was to teach men how to be able to seduce any woman, in fact this was the claim of the ad. And I quote, “Don’t leave love to chance. When you meet an attractive woman, make sure she’s yours in only five minutes. By developing the power of sexual visualization that all men have but few know how to use.” Unquote. Now very crudely what this ad claim is that a man, if he follows their directions, can seduce any woman in the world in five minutes. Now at the very least this involves a very low view of women. How are we going to account for this, what’s behind that thinking? Let’s turn again to Sartre. Because, in very crude form, this is Sartre’s philosophy. Sartre in his philosophy says that man has no essence, that is no defined nature. He is. And he is simply a produce of blind evolution. He must make himself into a god. But both he and his neighbor, at present, are without essence, without nature. Both are the products of blind, meaningless evolution. As a result, we are just blobs at the moment, products of the environment which is evolution. We have no meaning in and of ourselves, we have no nature, we have no definition. We should make ourselves into gods. Now if man is going to become god, he is going to have to exercise his godhood in two directions. Towards his environment, hence the thesis often propounded by scientists today, that man must now control evolution and guide it. Evolution has been his environment, making him. Now he has to make evolution. That’s one area where man must play god, towards the world around him. And this is why it’s the sinful who’s the great polluter. Because his way of playing god is to try to destroy the environment to prove his power over it, and it is when you have an age of sin that you have a great age of pollution.

You’ve had then over and over again. You’ve had in the centuries past every river of Europe virtually at one time or another, a stinking cesspool and all the fish dead. Pollution is not new, it’s come and gone in terms of man’s apostasy. Because man enjoys destroying, it’s one way of playing God.

The other area in which man plays god is in relationship to other people. After all if he is going to be god, they’ve got to be the devil. They’re going to frustrate him. And so he must attempt to play god in their lives. This is why, with the ungodly, human relations are a problem. Marriage is a problem. You have two people, each trying to play god in the other’s life. Trying to bend them to their will. Not to enjoy one another with all their virtues and sins and frailties, but to bend them, to remake them in terms of my will.

It is very interesting that the common term for seduction is ‘making’ a woman, and we speak of a woman being on the make. The whole point of it is to play with another person. To use them. To play god over them. Thus in the advertisement which I cited the godlike seducer becomes the total and omnipotent environment of any woman, and thus makes her totally in terms of his will. That’s the whole appeal of it. Play god absolutely. Any woman, in five minutes, and you’re absolute god. But if environmentalism is false, then men and women are creatures of God made in His image and responsible to Him. They cannot plead innocent by virtue of the environment. They neither gods nor victims. They are sinners.

To return to the advertisement, both the seducer and the seduced are sinners. And they must blame themselves for their sin. Both are equally at war with God and His law, both are intent on moral autonomy from God. Both are intent of self satisfaction. And they are defining what is good and evil in terms of what will it do for me? The moral code of the fallen man was very well stated by a thoroughly fallen man, Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway said this, and I quote, “What is moral is what you feel good after. And what immoral is what you feel bad after.” Unquote. In other words, morality is being faithful to your feelings. If you enjoy killing, wonderful. It’s good. If you feel good after you’ve stolen 500 or a 1000 dollars, it’s good. Of course, if it bothers you, then it’s bad for you. So don’t do it unless you enjoy it. This is Hemingway’s moral code. A long time ago the great reformed theologian Thomas Boston put it in these words. “Every man naturally loves to be at full liberty himself. To have his own will for his law. And if he would follow his natural inclinations, would vote himself out of the reach of all laws, divine and human.” Unquote. That’s it exactly. The natural man would vote himself out of all laws, divine and human. That’s how he wants to play god. And not only so, now as he faces the God of Scripture, he tries to redefine Him and to make God Himself after his own image and after the image of Satan. Yesterday someone gave me the May 1971 Pomona College bulletin. There’s a very interesting article by a professor of religion there, Frederick Sontag, entitled ‘The God of Revolution’.

And he says, and I quote, “To be understood in revolution is certainly a free god. Unfortunately a free god is also a severe god, since the code for his proper conduct is not rigidly defined.” Unquote. What he is saying is that God is free from any idea of right and wrong, in other words He has no nature. And so, he says, we cannot say that any particular politics or any particular revolution is the ideal one. Meeting such a god does not necessarily mean joining some particular political revolutionary movement, or that god always endorses institutional subversion. Why? Because it’s perpetual revolution. You’re against everything, you’re always against the establishment, whatever it may be. And if today it is thou shalt not kill nor commit adultery nor steal nor bear false witness then you’re for doing all those things. And if tomorrow that immorality is made into a code, then you’re against it. You’re perpetually against whatever is. This is remaking God in the image of Satan. And it is saying that there can be no thou shalt not’s. No law over man of any sort and that there is no law in god. Not only have men rebelled against God and tried to become their own gods, but they have tried to remake God in the image of Satan. There can be nothing to bind them. Nothing over them.

Recently, last Monday, there was a very interesting letter in the Ann Landers column, which I think very well illustrated the modern {?}. “Dear Ann Landers, I am a 20 year old boy who’s been looking for a job for seven weeks. The last three places I applied seemed promising but I wasn’t hired. I decided to check back and find out why. All three personal heads said my qualifications were excellent but my appearance was against me. What it boiled down to was long hair and a short beard. I finally asked the last personal guy if he would hire me if I would cut my hair and shave my beard. He replied yes. I looked him straight in the eye and said nuts to you, and walked out. The system is rotten and this is true. What has my hair and beard to do with my abilities? I consider it my constitutional right to wear my hair any way I please and have my beard if I want one. I would like your opinion on this. If I get the answer I want I will take it back to those jerks and shove it in their stupid faces.’

In other words, whatever is his constitutional right as he sees it, everyone must bow down to. This is the permissive age with a vengeance. I want my way and the world has to conform to my way. It doesn’t occur to him that an employer has the constitutional right to turn him down for a job. But he can do as he pleases, if tomorrow he chooses to wear a dress and go to work and apply for a job, his civil rights no doubt will be violated if they turn him down. My will be done. I am my own god and let the world bow down to me. It’s not surprising that in view of this we’re getting some child psychologists who are insistent that toilet training is doing violence to the child. Well, if you don’t train the child he does violence to your carpet. But of course that sort of thing doesn’t enter their minds. Thomas Boston said that every man naturally loves to be at full liberty himself. To have his own will for his law. And if he would follow his natural inclinations would vote himself out of the reach of all laws, human and divine. Boston went on to say, and I quote, “The un-renewed will is wholly perverse. In reference to man’s chief and highest end, the natural man’s chief end is not God but himself. Most men are so far from making God their chief end in their natural and civil actions that in these matters God is not in all their thoughts. Their eating and drinking and such like natural actions are for themselves. Their own pleasure or necessity without any higher end. Did ye not eat for yourselves? They have no eye to the glory of God in these things as they ought to have. They seek God indeed, but not for Himself but for themselves. They seek him not at all but for their own welfare. So their whole life is woven into one web of practical blasphemy, making God the means and themselves the end, yea their chief end.” Unquote.

Recently ‘Life’ had an article of the Jesus Freaks, which one of you passed on to me. Very, very revealing article. The Jesus Freaks believe that if they demand something from God, He’s got to deliver. After all, isn’t He dead? That’s their name for it. He’s got to come across. They believe in God only as the servant to themselves, who are the gods in their own imagination. This is not Christianity. It is making God the means, themselves the end. It is saying, yea hath God said? There is no sovereign decree or council for them. God is their servant and they the sovereign. And they reveal what they are. One of the most delightful pictures appeared during the recent march on Washington, it was on the front page of the ‘Harold Examiner’. It would be worth having a good copy of that to frame. It shows one long haired character, and passer-by’s, two or three men, going and coming from their offices, had torn his sign. And he was jumping up and down in rage and in frustration, like a child having a tantrum. And after all, this is what children are. Sinners. Revealing the second nature of man or second estate, depravity, this is why they have to be toilet trained, why they have to be disciplined, why they have to be taught, why they have to be redeemed. Because they reveal by their nature that the world revolves around themselves. But our God according to Scripture does whatsoever He pleases. He is sovereign, He who is the all righteous, all powerful, all holy God. And we are His people, called to serve Him and to bow down before Him and to rejoice in His omnipotence. And to rejoice that ours is the victory in Jesus Christ our Lord. For this is the victory that overcometh the world even our faith.

Let us pray. Almighty God our Heavenly Father we give thanks unto Thee that Thou art sovereign. King of kings and Lord of lords. Our Lord and our God, we come into Thy presence rejoicing that Thou hast called us to be Thy servants. Hast made us Thy sons in Jesus Christ. And hast confirmed us by Thy providence and Thy care. Make us ever truly grateful that we might ever render Thee Thy due service and praise and rejoice in Thee with all our heart, mind and being. In Jesus name Amen.

Are there any questions now, first of all with respect to our lesson.

Yes. Did someone have a question? Yes.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] Yes. Very good question. There is a significance. Satan himself had a subordinate role and was in rebellion. And therefore he chose someone who was in a subordinate role and beginning to be discontented with it and ready to rebel. Adam’s sin at the time was not so much rebellion as unwillingness to do his duty. Instead of taking the leadership, he became the follower. So this is the tendency of men, their sin is usually to become passive and to refuse to do their responsibilities, whereas with women, who take on more than is their responsibility. Yes.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] No, it was the first time after the Resurrection, but not the first time in history. Through out the centuries it had been the duty of Israel to proclaim the Gospel to all nations, all peoples. We don’t have any history of the missionary work of Israel. We do know that it existed, because there’re many hints of it in Scripture. And I’ve cited one in particular which gives a vivid account of the fact that there many from all peoples, and I’ll cite it again. Psalm 87. In Psalm 87 very definitely, as it speaks of the city of God, Zion, the true Jerusalem. I will make mention of Rahab and Babylon to them that know me: behold Philistia, and Tyre, with Ethiopia; this man was born there. And so on. The Psalmist, one of the sons of Korah apparently, sees the pilgrims marching in, Rahab, or an Egyptian, a Philistine, a Babylonian, someone from Tyre, a Canaanite. An Ethiopian. And he says as they go by, this man was born there. In other words, was born in Zion, the city of our God. So we know that they were coming as pilgrims, as believers. And Solomon, in his dedication prayer for the temple, prays especially that God will be mindful of the people who come from the far corners of the earth to worship at the temple. That He would especially bless them and answer their prayers. That they may go back as mighty witnesses unto the Lord. So we do have evidences right in the Scripture that there was a missionary program in ancient Israel to the far corners of the world.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] We have every reason to believe that after the Fall Adam and Eve were redeemed, that they did look forward to the Savior, in fact, prematurely, because when Cain was born Eve said I have gotten a man from the Lord. And that can be so read to mean that I’ve gotten the one, the man.

Hopeful that this was the one that was going to restore them, in other words, trusting oh it’ll be soon. Instead of waiting. And Cain turned out to be the first murderer.

Yes.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] A good question. The question is, was Satan, who is the Deceiver, deceiving Eve there when he said ye shall not surely die. Certainly it was not the truth. So in that respect it was deceit. I think also, you must say, Satan begins by deceiving himself first of all. So the first person Satan ever lied to was himself. And he probably believed his lie, that he could set aside God. And this is a basis on which he has operated. And this was the basis of the temptation in the wilderness. Let’s declare our independence from God, we can make it work. He is the Great Liar, but he lies to himself and he always says, age after age, it hasn’t been truth, it will be if I say the lie often enough it’ll work. So he is self-deceived, as well as the Deceiver. I think Milton in his Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained does a superb job of portraying Satan. When he portrays Satan first after the Fall, Satan is quite heroic and in his speech in Hell to the fallen angels he goes through all kinds of dramatic heroics. But by the time of the Temptation of our Lord, there’s a shabbiness about him. All the heroics have worn thin and now it’s a sneaky, shabby, dirty kind of front he makes. The lie is wearing thin.

Are there any other questions? Yes.

[Audience]..{?}..

[Dr. Rushdoony] No, I’m not familiar with it.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] If you can find out the name of the author and the full data, I’ll check into that.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] Any other questions? We have just about a minute or two minutes left. Yes.

[Audience]…{?}…

[Dr. Rushdoony] Well, here is her answer to the young man. Sorry buddy, when you are asking for something you do it their way. If an employer doesn’t like want a kid with long hair and a beard it is his constitutional right not to hire him. Some of you kids make a lot more trouble for yourselves than you need. You walk around mad at the world, unpleasant, surly, daring people not to accept you. You will do a lot better when you learn to smile and meet the world halfway. The chip of the shoulder is usually a sign that there is wood higher up.

Well I think our time is up, let’s bow our heads for the benediction.

And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you, this day and always, Amen.