sin
in our days we formed insignias
the passing glance unstamped
we've rendered ourselves powerless, fortunate
the useless mend the fixed
and on every hour it detonates
my courage goes unlooked
the ride home through perilous
the land it goes, i will...
~coheed & cambria
i had an interesting conversation the other day, and perhaps some of you could help me. the talk was about sin. a friend of mine said that it was stupid that any sin could damn one to hell. he believed that lying about taking a cookie was better than killing someone.
on the grand scheme of things i think that lying about taking a cookie does seem less terrible an offense than killing someone. however, the sin is sin. i tried to break it down to him this way- if you j-walk, you are breaking the law. if you murder someone, you are breaking the law. in either case you are breaking the law and are subject to penalty. if you lie about a cookie, or murder someone, you are subject to penalty.
does that make sense at all?
on the grand scheme of things i think that lying about taking a cookie does seem less terrible an offense than killing someone. however, the sin is sin. i tried to break it down to him this way- if you j-walk, you are breaking the law. if you murder someone, you are breaking the law. in either case you are breaking the law and are subject to penalty. if you lie about a cookie, or murder someone, you are subject to penalty.
does that make sense at all?
and how do you really know that the stolen cookie doesn't kill someone? huh? you don't know.
Posted by Lucas | Thu Jun 23, 03:57:00 PM 2005
I totally agree with you, and it makes perfect sense to me. A sin is a sin, whether that sin is breaking the law by speeding, or robbing a bank.
Posted by Anna Nymity | Thu Jun 23, 04:41:00 PM 2005
ok- it is actually a good analogy.
i am not necessarily talking about consequences- but the act. a sin can be 'great' or 'small', but it is still sin. just as murder is against the law, as is the lesser offense of jay-walking. no matter how terrible or small the deed was, it is still deemed 'illegal' or 'sin'.
as far as consequences go, i was just saying that both cenarios had them. it was just to prove to my friend that a small sin, ipso facto, is sin, just as breaking a minor law is illegal.
as for the rest, let me get at it this weekend.
Posted by billiam | Thu Jun 23, 09:19:00 PM 2005