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ORIGINAL SIN
Are All to Suffer from it Eternally?
"WE believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam's transgressions."
Belief in original sin, with its dread incubus as a burden from which none can escape, has for ages cast its depressing shadow over the human heart and mind. Accepting as fact the account outlined in Genesis concerning the transgression of the parents of the race, every thoughtful reader must have wondered as to whether he is to suffer throughout this life and beyond for a deed in which he had no part, and for which, according to his natural conception of justice and right, he was not even indirectly responsible. If he assumes an affirmative answer to his honest query, he must have stood aghast at the seeming injustice of it all.
The Scriptures proclaim in definite terms the fact of individual responsibility, and as an indispensable consequence, the Free Agency of Man. Freedom to choose or reject and accountability for the choice go hand in hand. The word of Divine revelation made the matter plain very early in the history of mankind. To evil-hearted Cain the Lord said: "If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door." (Gen. 4:7.)
A knowledge of good and evil is essential to progress, and the school of experience in mortality has been provided for the acquirement of such knowledge. The Divine purpose was thus enunciated by an ancient Hebrew prophet:
"Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore man could not act for himself, save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other. . .. Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great mediation of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself." (Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 2:16 and 27.)
And a later prophet voiced the eternal truth as addressed to his wayward fellows: