Archive Record · Wisdom Topic
Sin: The Philosophy of Moral Failure & Redemption
Explore the philosophy of sin through Augustine, Aquinas, and Kant: original sin, moral failure, guilt, grace, and the question of whether human nature is fundamentally broken.
A curated topic hub for the philosophical study of sin, connecting the doctrine of original sin with questions of moral failure, guilt, grace, and the possibility of redemption.
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Sin: The Philosophy of Moral Failure & Redemption
Questions for further inquiry
Key Questions
Is Faith Rational?
Is faith a vice of credulity, a virtue of trust, or something else? Explore the philosophical debate from Aquinas and Pascal through reformed epistemology and evidentialism.
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What Is Sin?
Sin is the moral and religious failure at the heart of the human condition. Explore Augustine's account of sin as disordered love, Aquinas's distinction of mortal and venial sin, and the modern philosophical debate.
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What Is the Problem of Evil?
The problem of evil argues that the existence of evil is incompatible with an all-good, all-powerful God. Trace the logical and evidential versions, Mackie's formulation, and the main theistic replies.
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What Is a Theodicy?
A theodicy is a justification of God's goodness in the face of evil. Trace the term's Leibnizian origin, the main types (Augustinian, Irenaean, soul-making), and the difference between theodicy and defense.
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Ideas that shape the theme
Wisdom Concepts
Evil: The Wisdom of Confronting Darkness
Evil wisdom is the courage to confront darkness honestly — not explaining suffering away but facing its reality and finding meaning within it. From Augustine's free will defense to the silence of Job, this is the wisdom of refusing easy answers.
wisdom
God: The Wisdom of the Divine
God wisdom is the philosophical contemplation of the divine as the ground of being and the mystery of existence itself — the human search for ultimate meaning that runs through every tradition, from Aquinas's five ways to the silence of the mystics.
wisdom
Voices in the archive
Important Thinkers
Augustine of Hippo
Augustine of Hippo (354-430) was a North African bishop and philosopher whose synthesis of Christian theology with Greek philosophy shaped Western thought for over a millennium.
thinker
Thomas Aquinas
A comprehensive introduction to Thomas Aquinas, the thirteenth-century Dominican philosopher whose synthesis of Aristotelian philosophy with Christian theology shaped Western intellectual life for centuries.
thinker
Immanuel Kant
German philosopher whose critical philosophy revolutionized epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics through systematic accounts of reason, experience, and moral duty.
thinker
Søren Kierkegaard
Danish writer, theologian, and philosopher whose accounts of inwardness, choice, anxiety, and faith helped shape later existential thought.
thinker
Primary and enduring texts
Classic Books
Traditions for comparison
Related Philosophies
Philosophy of Evil
An introduction to the philosophy of evil: the logical and evidential problems of evil, theodicy, the free will defense, natural vs moral evil, and the soul-making approach, from Augustine to Plantinga and Hick.
philosophy
Philosophy of Faith
An introduction to the philosophy of faith: the relationship between faith and reason, the nature of faith, reformed epistemology, evidentialism, and the ethics of belief, from Aquinas to Plantinga.
philosophy
Philosophy of God
An introduction to the philosophy of God: the existence of God, divine attributes, the nature of divine action, and the coherence of theism, from Aquinas and Anselm to Swinburne and Plantinga.
philosophy
Ethics
An introduction to ethics, the philosophical study of morality, examining its central questions, major traditions, and the thinkers who shaped our understanding of how to live and act.
philosophy
Philosophy of Religion
Philosophy of religion is the philosophical examination of religious claims, concepts, and practices, including arguments for God's existence, the problem of evil, and the nature of faith.
philosophy
Quotation archive
Wisdom Passages
Curated collections for deeper study
Learning Paths
Religion, God & the Sacred: The Philosophy of Religion Learning Path
A structured learning path through the philosophy of religion: from the philosophy of God and the problem of evil to atheism, faith, religious experience, miracles, prayer, sin, and the sacred.
collection
Ethics & Moral Wisdom
A structured learning path through moral philosophy, from the great ethical theories of duty, utility, and virtue to the practical art of making ethical decisions in everyday life.
collection
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