A Timely Article on this Matter:
Death in Adam – Life in Christ
You charge me that I should say the first Adam was born or created blind; and this, you say, is error, heresy and false doctrine. Answer: First; I did say that every man, by nature is born blind, in respect of discerning the things of God. {I Cor.2:14} Secondly; I said also, that the first Adam in his created state was blind, as to the understanding of the Mystery of God in Christ to be revealed unto him, or as to the true knowledge of himself and the condition he was then in. He had the sight of sense, he saw his wife, the tree and the apple that he did eat; but he had not a sight of the imperfection and shortness of the present state he was then in, and to that which he was afterwards to be raised up unto in Christ. For; if he had known the property of the Tree of Life, {which represented Christ} he would not have forsaken and rejected it, but rather have eaten of the fruit thereof, that he might have lived; as the Apostle speaks. “Which none of the princes of this world knew; for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” {I Cor.2:8} If Adam that was the chiefest and most excellent in knowledge above all other creatures in the world; if he had known the mystery of Christ in the Tree of Life, he would not have been seduced by the Serpent to seek his perfection in the forbidden fruit. Man that is ignorant of God’s Righteousness, goeth about to establish his own. {Rom.10:3} Why else is not the opening of their eyes affirmed of Adam and Eve, till after their eating of the forbidden fruit? {Gen.3:7} What coverings had they of the divine nature, glory and righteousness of God in the day of their Creation; and could they see the want thereof before their eyes were opened? Let me further illustrate this thing thus: A child as soon as it is born, is said to be an innocent, harmless child, free from the guilt or commission of any {personal} sin; is his nature therefore pure, perfect, holy, heavenly, and void of all inclinations to sin? Again, Paul saith of himself, that he was blameless as touching the righteousness of the Law, {Phil.3:6,} before his conversion; had he therefore an adequate righteousness, every way agreeable and equal to the spirituality and holiness of the Law? Before the Law came he had little or no sin, he was lusty and strong in his fleshly confidence, he came into no misfortune or danger of his life; but when the Law entered, his sin abounded, his strength weakened, his life withered and died. {Rom.5:20, 7:9} Sin was in his nature before, but not discovered till the Commandment came; it lay in him as a dead thing, underground, out of sight, and out of mind, it troubled him not, it was as a benumbed or dead member, he was not sensible of it at all. Without the Law, sin is dead. {Rom.7:8} Thus the first Adam, as he was created innocent, {so they speak,} harmless, and void as yet of doing any evil till the act of his disobedience in eating; but his condition, state, or nature, in the day of his Creation, was not as pure, perfect, and holy as the Law of God; and the commandment came unto him to kill him, to make sin abound and become exceeding sinful, that he might not think his present state sufficient, and content himself therewith, but die unto that, and seek a better state in Christ. He was naked and without the Wedding garment at first, {Gen.2:25 – Note: Nakedness is want of Divine Righteousness,} but was not ashamed of his nakedness; he was showed, told, and convinced of his nakedness by his presumptuous undertaking, of being more perfect in his own way; and therefore God reasons thus with him; “who told thee that thou wast naked; Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? {Gen.3:11} Thus Adam who was alive before the commandment came, is now killed by the Letter, and dies to that first life, his resurrection to a better life being by the Promised Seed. Mr. Baker: But Adam in his Creation was not as Paul and all men else, or as children are now since the Fall, defiled with any original pollution. Answer: First; I do not say that Adam was contaminated with any act of sin, or uncleanness before his fall; yet this doth not prove him to be as exactly holy and perfect as the Law, for if he had been so, how came he so crooked and contrary to the Law? The perfection of the Law consists in perpetuity as well as in purity and such should the state of Adam have been if it had been equal to the Law. Yet, Secondly; if Adam had not in him the Principles and Seeds of sin, how could he have transgressed and become a sinner? For the spawn of wickedness and evil in the Devil had not been enough to produce and propagate the prodigious off-spring of iniquity and sin, unless there had been suitable matter in the nature of Adam to mix with his serpentine suggestion and temptation. It is said, {Jn.14:30,} that the Prince of the world came to Christ, and found nothing in him. He could never fasten any temptation on Christ, all his assaults could not prevail over him; had he found as little in the first Adam, as he did in the Second, there had been the like success, {Mt.4:11,} and no monster of Misery had been brought into the World. Henry Pinnell {Word of Prophesy, 1648}
