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Total Hereditary Depravity?

This question is for Calvinists and those who believe in the doctrine of Total Depravity (the "T" in TULIP).

Since a Christian has this depravity removed (or at least the curse of it), how does his children still inherit it if they were born after he was converted?

The Westminster Confession of Faith states, “They (Adam and Eve) being the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed, and the same death in sin and corrupted nature conveyed to all their posterity, descending from them by ordinary generation. From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions.”

It is inherited from your parents who inherited from their parents all the way up to Adam and Eve. But, how can you inherit something that is removed?

2 Answers

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  • 1 decade ago
    Favorite Answer

    In Eden, Adam acted not simply as a private person, the results of whose conduct affected none but himself, but rather as a public person, so that what he did, directly concerned and judicially involved others. Adam was much more than the father of the human race: he was also their legal agent, standing in their stead. His descendants were not only in him generatively as their natural head, but also morally and legally as their moral and legal head. In other words, by divine constitution and covenant, Adam acted as the federal representative of all his children.

    The whole human race was placed on probation in the person of its legal representative and covenant head. Instead of placing each member of humanity on probation separately and successively, it pleased God to put the whole race on formal trial once and for all in the person of their head.

    "By one man sin entered." "And so death passed upon all men"

    Source(s): The Total Depravity of Man by A.W. Pink http://www.lgmarshall.org/Pink/pink_depravity.html
  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    be vigilant at all times and pray

    that you may have strength to stand

    before the son of man

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