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Thesis (Th. M.)--Calvin Theological Seminary, 1990. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-117).

The purpose of this research was to look at what sin or sins was human condemnation based on primarily. This study takes a look at the words or concepts, passages, and interpretations of the text and doctrines associated with the terms of sin and condemnation. In concerns to sin, this paper argues that the core of sin is an internal rejection of God. This is shown by looking at key Biblical passages and the words for sin and desire to find out how exactly sin is defined biblically. This section also deals with the historical and different systematic definitions of sin while taking a look at the doctrine of Original Sin and how sin was an inherited state of rejection. The concept of condemnation is also examined and defined in this paper. It is argued that condemnation is the result of God’s judgment on humanity because of their rejection of Him. This is shown through a similar method as defining the concept for sin.

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This thesis comprises a re-evaluation of the feminist theological critique, as given by Valerie Saiving, Judith Plaskow, Daphne Hampson and Susan Nelson Dunfee, of Reinhold Niebuhr's doctrine of sin. The re-evaluation proceeds from a contextual interpretation of Niebuhr's theology in general and a contextual reading of his doctrine of sin in particular. My argument is that Niebuhr is deliberately and consistently a contextual theologian. I locate his contextual methodology in the open-ended approach of Christian realism. / The feminist critique is based on the assumption that Niebuhr universally defines the primary sin as pride. It is argued that pride is in fact a distinctly male characteristic, and, while quite plausibly the primary sin for men, is clearly not the primary sin for women. Niebuhr is guilty, that is, of confusing male reality with human reality in the doctrine. Saiving and Plaskow then develop a definition of women's sin which they correspond with Niebuhr's sin of sensuality. This type of sin, rather than being self-aggrandizing, is characterized by inordinate and destructive self-effacement. Their subsidiary argument is that Niebuhr erroneously treats sensuality, which should be equal but opposite to pride, as a secondary form of sin. / My argument in this thesis is that the critique rests on a mistaken assumption about the universality of Niebuhr's claim. His concerns were with the powerful. The contextual claim that pride is the primary form of sin in those who are empowered is being mistaken for a claim that pride is the primary sin for all people, regardless of gender or context. My subsidiary argument is that the correlation of women's sin with Niebuhr's understanding of sensuality is mistaken. What the feminists refer to as women's sin is in fact not sin at all for Niebuhr but evidence of injustice. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

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