Ancestral Sin or Original Sin?

Greetings,

I have recently come across my 2nd part Eastern Orthodox / part something else person on social media.

The 1st was very boutique and cafeteria in his theology. He was part Restorationist, part Baptist, part Hebrew Roots and part Eastern Orthodox. Now I have met a part Arminian and part Eastern Orthodox. The one thing they both have in common is they both condemn Augustine as a heretic (free clue - history is not on your side here), both are 'free-will' advocates - but this most recent one denies original sin in favor of 'ancestral sin.'

He says he makes his arguments on Patristic grounds. Really?

 

Because I'm not finding much about it in the Fathers. Not in Schaff-Roberts.

1 hit in the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture.

1 hit in the Catholic University of America Fathers of the Church.

The second quote shown above should be quoted (for those who cannot read the screen caps):

(9) Hear, also, what may move you more and trouble you, and, would that it might, change you for the better. Who does not know that the Gallic bishop Hilary is to be revered as the keenest defender of the Catholic Church against the heretics? Note what he says when dealing with the flesh of Christ. ‘Therefore, when He was sent in the likeness of sinful flesh (Rom. 8:3), He did not have the sin though He had the flesh. But, since all flesh comes from sin—namely, descended from the ancestral sin of Adam—He was sent in the likeness of sinful flesh, not that the sin existed in Him, but the likeness of sinful flesh.’ Again he says in his exposition of Psalm 118, when he comes to the words: ‘Let my soul live and praise thee’( Ps. 118:175): ‘He does not think he lives in this life, for he had said: “Behold I have been conceived in iniquities, and in sins did my mother bear me.( Ps. 50:7)" He knows that he was born of sinful origin and under the law of sin.’ Do you understand what you hear? Do you ask what you should say? If you have any sense of shame, do you dare accuse on this matter of original sin a man so gloriously outstanding among Catholic bishops and so conspicuous in fame and honor? - Augustine of Hippo, Against Julian, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Matthew A. Schumacher, vol. 35, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1957), 9–10.

Is my interlocutor presenting me with a false definition and a false choice? Seems in the one place it shows up in the Fathers (Augustine no less - ah the irony!), the two terms seem interchangeable.

Now, as for original sin:

319 results in 203 articles in 24 resources in Schaff-Roberts.

54 results in 43 articles in 21 resources in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture.

Lastly 362 results in 183 articles in 46 resources in the Catholic University of America's Fathers of the Church set.

It's original sin by a landslide with 735 results versus 2 results for ancestral sin. But that doesn't matter because ancestral sin seems to mean the same thing as original sin.

And yes, there are Eastern Orthodox who not only believe in original sin, but think they agree with Augustine:

The consideration of cleansing brings us to two related teachings—original sin and atonement. The Orthodox, with their Protestant and Catholic brothers and sisters, affirm that this world is fallen, and because of this we are born into an environment where it is easier for us to do evil rather than good. Though our solidarity with the rest of humanity, we are entangled in a web of deceit, of hatred and of sin. And through our personal contribution, this state of fallenness continues. Original sin points to our solidarity with the rest of humanity and does not, in a strict sense, imply guilt. Rather, it points to our involvement. The Incarnation, Jesus, is God’s supreme answer to the question of personal and original sin. Because through Christ, we are restored to communion with God. The Incarnation and death of Christ are not viewed by Orthodoxy as solely a settling of accounts nor a ransoming (although there are some aspects of this in Christ’s work). The essence of the Incarnation is love. Christ’s work is not just a reversal of sin and death, but also an inauguration of an essentially new stage in the history of man. We now, at last, see clearly what humanity is to become. - Alexander Melnyk, “What Is Eastern Orthodoxy Anyway?,” Christian History Magazine-Issue 18: How Christianity Came to Russia (Worcester, PA: Christian History Institute, 1988).

Not only as a matter of experience, is no man sinless, but no man can, by any possibility, be free from sin (Ps. cxviii., He, 16). Because of the sin of one sentence is passed upon all (Ps. lix. 4 ); the sentence of slavery which is so deep a degradation that the victim of sin forfeits even the name of man (Ib. cxlii. 6, cxviii., Iod, 2). But Hilary not only states the doctrine; he approaches very nearly, on rare occasions, to the term ‘original sin.’ It follows that nothing less than a regeneration, the free gift of God, will avail (Matt. x. 24) and the grace by which the Christian must be maintained is also His spontaneous and unconditional gift. Faith, knowledge, Christian life, all have their origin and their maintenance from Him (Ps. cxviii). Such is a brief statement of Hilary’s position as a forerunner of St. Augustine. - E. W. Watson, “St. Hilary of Poitiers: Introduction,” in St. Hilary of Poitiers, John of Damascus, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, vol. 9a, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Second Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1899), lxxxvi–lxxxvii.

So the ancestral sin -vs- original sin dichotomy is bogus.