given dominion himself came under the twofold dominion of sin and death.  One

has only to read 2 Corinthians 4:4, 'the light of the gospel of the glory of

Christ, Who is the Image of God', to see the complete reversal of this

failure on the part of Adam brought about by the redemption that is in Christ

Jesus.  There are one or two passages in the New Testament  which, taken

together, present an inspired and authoritative definition of sin.

'Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the

transgression of the law' (1 John 3:4).

A literal translation of this verse reads:

'Everyone who is doing the sin is doing the lawlessness also, and the

sin is the lawlessness'.

'The sin is the lawlessness'.  The definition is negative.  In 1 John

5:17 we read, 'All unrighteousness is sin'.  Again unrighteousness is

negative.  In Romans 14:23 we read, 'Everything which is not of faith is

sin'.  Not out of faith is once more a negative.  Here we have the three

occasions where Scripture uses the expression 'sin is', and in each case it

has to be defined by a negative.  Sin is the negation of law, of right, of

Anomia and anomos do not in their primary sense mean transgression, but

rather that state denominated 'not under law', with its resulting condition,

'lawless'.  For example, 1 Corinthians 9:20 and 21 places the Jew who was

'under the law' in contrast with the Gentile who was anomos, 'without law',

in this instance limiting nomos to the law as revealed in the Old Testament.

The same may be said of Romans 2:12, 'those who sinned without law'; for in

the fuller sense sin cannot be imputed where there is no law at all (Rom.

5:13).  Sin is that state and resulting condition that places the sinner

outside the pale of God's law (not necessarily limiting the word to the law

of Moses).  Righteousness, on the other hand, is that condition and state

arising out of complete conformity to God's law (not necessarily limiting the

word to the Mosaic).  Hence sin and righteousness are the two extremes, sin

the negative, righteousness the positive.  This is further emphasized in the

words, 'All unrighteousness is sin' (1 John 5:17).

It is an indescribable comfort to have reached this Scriptural

conclusion.  Darkness is the negation of light; sin is the negation of right.

The perennial dispute as to the origin of sin ceases to have interest.  God

is light, darkness is the result of shutting out the light.  We are here

concerned with the positive 'light'; there is no problem concerning the

negative 'darkness'.  All the other phases of sin with which Scripture and

experience have made us familiar are but the 'unfruitful works of darkness';

they arise of necessity out of the lawless condition that is essentially sin.

Let us give attention to some of the outstanding developments of that

original failure whereby man 'sinned and came short of the glory of God'.

The first word which we intend to study is asham.  It occurs 35 times

in the Old Testament and is translated as follows in the A.V.: acknowledge

offence; be desolate; be found faulty; be found guilty; be guilty; be made