Westminster Confession of Faith
Chapter VI
Chapter VI
Of the Fall of Man, of Sin, and
I. Our first parents, being seduced by the subtilty and temptation of Satan, sinned, in eating the forbidden fruit.(a) This their sin God was pleased, according to His wise and holy counsel, to permit, having purposed to order it to His own glory.(b)
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(a) Gen. 3:13; II Cor. 11:3.
(b) Rom. 11:32. |
II. By this sin they fell from their original righteousness and communion, with God,(c) and so became dead in sin,(d) and wholly defiled in all the parts and faculties of soul and body.(e)
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(c) Gen. 3:6, 7, 8; Eccles. 7:29; Rom. 3:23.
(d) Gen. 2:17; Eph. 2:1. (e) Tit. 1:15; Gen. 6:5; Jer. 17:9; Rom. 3:10 to 19. |
III. They being the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed,(f) and the same death in sin and corrupted nature conveyed, to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation.(g)
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(f) Gen. 1:27, 28 & Gen. 2:16, 17 and Acts 17:26 with Rom. 5:12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and I Cor. 15:21, 22, 49.
(g) Ps. 51:5; Gen. 5:3; Job 14:4, Job 15:14. |
IV. From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good,(h) and wholly inclined to all evil,(i) do proceed all actual transgressions.(k)
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(h) Rom. 5:6; Rom. 8:7, Rom. 7:18; Col. 1:21.
(i) Gen. 6:5; Gen. 8:21; Rom. 3:10, 11, 12. (k) James 1:14, 15; Eph. 2:2, 3; Matt. 15:19. |
V. This corruption of nature, during this life, doth remain in those that are regenerated;(l) and although it be, through Christ, pardoned and mortified, yet both itself and all the motions thereof are truly and properly sin.(m)
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(l) I John 1:8, 10; Rom. 7:14, 17, 18, 23; James 3:2; Prov. 20:9; Eccles. 7:20.
(m) Rom. 7:5, 7, 8, 25; Gal. 5:17. |
VI. Every sin, both original and actual, being a transgression of the righteous law of God, and contrary thereunto,(n) doth, in its own nature, bring guilt upon the sinner;(o) whereby he is bound over to the wrath of God,(p) and curse of the law,(q) and so made subject to death,(r) with all miseries spiritual,(s) temporal,(t) and eternal.(u)
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(n) I John 3:4.
(o) Rom. 2:15; Rom. 3:9, 19. (p) Ephes. 2:3. (q) Gal. 3:10. (r) Rom. 6:23. (s) Ephes. 4:18. (t) Rom. 8:20; Lam. 3:39. (u) Matt. 25:41, II Thess. 1:9. |
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