Sinning Against The Holy Spirit

[Paladin D]

There is a passage in the Bible, that says that those who sin against the Holy Spirit, will not be forgiven. How does one specifically sin against the Holy Spirit? I think I saw something about this in the CCC.

[Quietfire]

Can you find the exact passage?
Then it may be easier to answer.

thanks.


Peace.

[Paladin D]

[b]31[/b] Therefore, I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.
[b]32[/b] And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

[Paladin D]

Oops, that's [b]Matthew 12:31-32[/b].

[Paladin D]

Found something in the CCC [b]1864[/b]. But it's somewhat vague, don't understand it.

[Aloysius]

isn't blasphemy against the Holy Spirit a sin against forgiveness itself? Like, the sin of presumption, you presume you're gonna be forgiven so you just keep living in sin assuming you're forgiven. That's blaspheming the Holy Spirit, so basically there's no forgiveness. Or refusing to accept forgiveness would blaspheme the Holy Spirit, so there's no forgiveness (because you won't allow it)

that's kinda my understanding of it, i think someone made a fuller answer to that question somewhere around here a while back.

[Quietfire]

I hopes this helps Paladin...

verse 31. [i]The blasphemy of the Spirit.[/i]
The sin here spoken of is that blasphemy by which the Pharisees attributed the miracles of Christ, wrought by the Spirit of God, to [i]Beelsebub[/i] the prince of devils.
Now this kind of sin is usually accompanied with so much obstinacy and such wilful opposing the Spirit of God and the known truth, that men who are guilty of it are seldom or never converted: and therefore are never forgiven, because they will not repent. Otherwise, there is no sin which God cannot or will not forgive to such as sincerely repent and have recourse to the keys of the church.

verse 32. [u]Nor in the world to come.[/u]
From these words St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, lib. 21, c. 13)and St. Gregory (Dialog., 4, c.39) gather that some sins may be remitted in the world to come; and, consequently, that there is a purgatory or a middle place.


Peace.

[Quietfire]

lets see, in plain english...
The Pharisees saw all the work of Christ as the work of the devil.
As such their heart were hardened to receive the Holy Spirit, which is the TRUTH. They then had Christ arrested, tried, and crucified. Again, though, Our Lord still asked for their sins to be forgiven. "For they no not what they do." If they confess their sins at any point, they will be forgiven, but it must be done with sincerity. But in the context of those verses, it is a warning to all who refuse to accept Christ as the Son of God, who is God. It is still a warning to us. When one receives the TRUTH, he has that knowledge and then must make a decision.

Get busy living...or get busy dying.

The second verse pretty much speaks for itself.

[Crusader_4]

I have always understood it as mentioned above to reject the forgiveness of the lord...thus how Can the Lord forgive someone who rejects the forgiveness?

[Donna]

Quietfire, was your initial commentary post taken from the notes of the Douay- Rheims (DRV) Bible? It looked very familiar.

[Livin_the_MASS]

[quote][b]Matthew 12 :31-32

"The sin Jesus speaks about here is termed, "sin against the Holy Spirit", because external expression of God's goodness are specially attributed to the third person of the Blessed Trinity. Sin against the Holy Spirit is said to be unforgivable not so much because of it's gravity or malice but because of the subjective disposition of the sinner in this case: his attitude shuts the door on repentance. Sin against the Holy Spirit consists in maliciously attributing to the devil the miracles and signs wrought by Christ. Thus the very nature of sin blocks the persons route to Christ, who is the only one who can take away the sin of the world (JN. 1:29), and the sinner puts himself outside the range of God's forgiveness. In this sense the sins against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven."[/b][/quote]



Commentary: NAVARRE BIBLE, on the interpretation, page 127

God Bless
Jason

[Quietfire]

Donna,

A big yes on that question. Taken right out of it. Thats why I asked for the chapter and verse numbers.


Peace.

[jasJis]

Here is a link to New Advent's article that is from the Summa Theologica [url="http://www.newadvent.org/summa/301401.htm"]LINK[/url]

My understanding is that Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is not neccessarily a single sin. It includes continued refusal of acknowledging the Holy Spirit, it's works of mercy and charity (especially forgiveness of the Father) which will then lead to a final obstinate refusal of God's forgiveness. That is not to say that we can't intentionally refuse the God's forgiveness through the Holy Spirit.

Check out the link and tell my your thoughts.

Edit to add this easier to understand synopsis of the section in Summa:
.

St. Thomas, whom we may safely follow, gives a very good summary of opinions in II-II, Q. xiv. He says that blasphemy against the Holy Ghost was and may be explained in three ways.


1- Sometimes, and in its most literal signification, it has been taken to mean the uttering of an insult against the Divine Spirit, applying the appellation either to the Holy Ghost or to all three Divine persons. This was the sin of the Pharisees, who spoke at first against "the Son of Man", criticizing the works and human ways of Jesus, accusing Him of loving good cheer and wine, of associating with the publicans, and who, later on, with undoubted bad faith, traduced His Divine works, the miracles which He wrought by virtue of His own Divinity.

2- On the other hand, St. Augustine frequently explains blasphemy against the Holy Ghost to be final impenitence, perseverance till death in mortal sin. This impenitence is against the Holy Ghost, in the sense that it frustrates and is absolutely opposed to the remission of sins, and this remission is appropriated to the Holy Ghost, the mutual love of the Father and the Son. In this view, Jesus, in Matthew 12 and Mark 3 did not really accuse the Pharisees of blaspheming the Holy Ghost, He only warned them against the danger they were in of doing so.

3- Finally, several Fathers, and after them, many scholastic theologians, apply the expression to all sins directly opposed to that quality which is, by appropriation, the characteristic quality of the Third Divine Person. Charity and goodness are especially attributed to the Holy Ghost, as power is to the Father and wisdom to the Son. Just, then, as they termed sins against the Father those that resulted from frailty, and sins against the Son those that sprang from ignorance, so the sins against the Holy Ghost are those that are committed from downright malice, either by despising or rejecting the inspirations and impulses which, having been stirred in man's soul by the Holy Ghost, would turn him away or deliver him from evil.

It is easy to see how this wide explanation suits all the circumstances of the case where Christ addresses the words to the Pharisees. These sins are commonly reckoned six: despair, presumption, impenitence or a fixed determination not to repent, obstinacy, resisting the known truth, and envy of another's spiritual welfare.

The sins against the Holy Ghost are said to be unpardonable, but the meaning of this assertion will vary very much according to which of the three explanations given above is accepted. As to final impenitence it is absolute; and this is easily understood, for even God cannot pardon where there is no repentance, and the moment of death is the fatal instant after which no mortal sin is remitted. It was because St. Augustine considered Christ's words to imply absolute unpardonableness that he held the sin against the Holy Ghost to be solely final impenitence. In the other two explanations, according to St. Thomas, the sin against the Holy Ghost is remissable -- not absolutely and always, but inasmuch as (considered in itself) it has not the claims and extenuating circumstance, inclining towards a pardon, that might be alleged in the case of sins of weakness and ignorance. He who, from pure and deliberate malice, refuses to recognize the manifest work of God, or rejects the necessary means of salvation, acts exactly like a sick man who not only refuses all medicine and all food, but who does all in his power to increase his illness, and whose malady becomes incurable, due to his own action. It is true, that in either case, God could, by a miracle, overcome the evil; He could, by His omnipotent intervention, either nuillify the natural causes of bodily death, or radically change the will of the stubborn sinner; but such intervention is not in accordance with His ordinary providence; and if he allows the secondary causes to act, if He offers the free human will of ordinary but sufficient grace, who shall seek cause of complaint? In a word, the irremissableness of the sins against the Holy Ghost is exclusively on the part of the sinner, on account of the sinner's act.

Edited May 31, 2004 by jasJis

[phatcatholic]

jasjis..........thanks for the awesome info

[Dave]

Some examples of sins that can lead to final impenitence include presumption of forgiveness, despair of one's salvation, and opposing known truths of the faith, according to the late great Fr. John Hardon in his Pocket Catholic Dictionary. Unfortunately, I don't have the dictionary in front of me, so there may be more examples than that.