Reference: Guilt
Hastings
1. Guilt may be defined in terms of relativity. It is rather the abiding result of sin than sin itself (see Pearson's Exposition of the Creed, ed. James Nichols, p. 514 f.). It is not punishment, or even liability to punishment, for this presupposes personal consciousness of wrong-doing and leaves out of account the attitude of God to sin unwittingly committed (Le 5:1 ff.; cf. Lu 12:48; Ro 5:13; see Sanday-Headlam, Romans, p. 144). On the other hand, we may describe it as a condition, a state, or a relation; the resultant of two forces drawing different ways (Ro 7:14 ff.). It includes two essential factors, without which it would be unmeaning as an objective reality or entity. At one point stands personal holiness, including whatever is holy in man; at another, personal corruption, including what is evil in man. Man's relation to God, as it is affected by sin, is what constitutes guilt in the widest sense of the word. The human struggle after righteousness is the surest evidence of man's consciousness of racial and personal guilt, and an acknowledgment that his position in this respect is not normal.
We are thus enabled to see that when moral obliquity arising from or reinforced by natural causes, adventitious circumstances, or personal environment, issues in persistent, wilful wrong-doing, it becomes or is resolved into guilt, and involves punishment which is guilt's inseparable accompaniment. In the OT the ideas of sin, guilt, and punishment are so inextricably interwoven that it is impossible to treat of one without in some way dealing with the other two, and the word for each is used interchangeably for the others (see Schultz, OT Theol. ii. p. 306). An example of this is found in Cain's despairing complaint, where the word 'punishment' (Ge 4:13 English Version) includes both the sin committed and the guilt attaching thereto (cf. Le 26:41).
2. In speaking of the guilt of the race or of the individual, some knowledge of a law governing moral actions must be presupposed (cf. Joh 9:41; 15:22,24). It is when the human will enters into conscious antagonism to the Divine will that guilt emerges into objective existence and crystallizes (see Martensen, Christian Dogmatics, Eng. tr p. 203 ff.). An educative process is thus required in order to bring home to the human race that sense of guilt without which progress is impossible (cf. Ro 3:20; 7:7). As soon, however, as this consciousness is established, the first step on the road to rebellion against sin is taken, and the sinner's relation to God commences to become fundamentally altered from what it was. A case in point, illustrative of this inchoate stage, is afforded by Joseph's brothers in their tardy recognition of a guilt which seems to have been latent in a degree, so far as their consciousness was concerned, up to the period of threatened consequences (Ge 42:21; cf. for a similar example of strange moral blindness, on the part of David, 2Sa 12:1 ff.). Their subsequent conduct was characterized by clumsy attempts to undo the mischief of which they had been the authors. A like feature is observable in the attitude of the Philistines when restoring the sacred 'ark of the covenant' to the offended Jehovah. A 'guilt-offering' had to be sent as a restitution for the wrong done (1Sa 6:3, cf. 2Ki 12:16). This natural instinct was developed and guided in the Levitical institutions by formal ceremony and religious rite, which were calculated to deepen still further the feeling of guilt and fear of Divine wrath. Even when the offence was committed in ignorance, as soon as its character was revealed to the offender, he became thereupon liable to punishment, and had to expiate his guilt by restitution and sacrifice, or by a 'guilt-offering' (AV 'trespass offering,' Le 5:15 ff; Le 6:1 ff.). To this a fine, amounting to one-fifth of the value of the wrong done in the case of a neighbour, was added and given to the injured party (Le 6:5; Nu 5:6 f.). How widely diffused this special rite had become is evidenced by the numerous incidental references of Ezekiel (Eze 40:39; 42:13; 44:29; 46:20); while perhaps the most remarkable allusion to this service of restitution occurs in the later Isaiah, where the ideal Servant of Jehovah is described as a 'guilt-offering' (Isa 53:10).
3. As might be expected, the universality of human guilt is nowhere more insistently dwelt on or more fully realized than in the Psalms (cf. Ps 14:2; 53:2, where the expression 'the sons of men' reveals the scope of the poet's thought; see also Ps 36 with its antithesis
See Verses Found in Dictionary
And Cain said to Yahweh, "My punishment [is] greater than [I can] bear.
Then each said to his brother, "Surely we [are] guilty on account of our brother when we saw the anguish of his soul when he pleaded for mercy to us and we would not listen. Therefore this trouble has come to us."
keeping loyal love to the thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and he does not leave utterly unpunished, punishing [the] guilt of fathers on sons and on sons of sons on third and fourth [generations]."
" 'When a person sins in that he hears [the] utterance of a curse and he [is] a witness or he sees or he knows, if he does not make [it] known, then he shall bear his guilt.
"When a person {displays infidelity} and he sins in an unintentional wrong {in any of} Yahweh's holy things, then he shall bring his guilt offering to Yahweh: a ram without defect from the flock as a guilt offering by your valuation [in] silver shekels according to the sanctuary shekel.
or {regarding} anything about which he has sworn {falsely}, then he shall repay it {according to} its value and shall add one-fifth of its value to it--he must give it {to whom it belongs} on the day of his guilt offering.
Thus the goat shall bear on it to {a barren region} all their guilt, and he shall send the goat away into the desert.
I myself also went against them in hostility, and I brought them into the land of their enemies--or [if] then their uncircumcised heart is humbled and then they pay for their guilt,
"Speak to the {Israelites}: 'When a man or woman {commits} any of the sins of humankind by acting unfaithfully, [it is] a sin against Yahweh, and that person will be guilty;
They said, "If you [are] sending the ark of the God of Israel away, you must not send it away empty, but by all means return it with a guilt offering. Then you will be healed and it will become known to you why his hand [is] not turned aside from you."
So Yahweh sent Nathan to David, and he came to him and said, "Two men were in a certain city; one [was] rich and the other [was] poor.
[The] money of [the] guilt offering and [the] money of [the] sin offering was not brought into the temple of Yahweh, but were [each] for the priests.
Yahweh looks down from heaven upon the children of humankind to see whether there is one who has insight, one who cares about God.
God looks down from heaven upon the children of humankind to see whether there is one who has insight, one who seeks God.
Let them be blotted out of [the] book of [the] living, and let them not be recorded with [the] righteous.
When he is judged, let him come out guilty, and let his prayer become as sin.
Yet Yahweh was pleased to crush him; he {made him sick}. If she places his life a guilt offering, he will see offspring. He will prolong days, and the will of Yahweh will succeed in his hand.
Therefore, I will divide to him [a portion] among the many, and with [the] strong ones he will divide bounty, {because} he poured his life out to death and was counted with [the] transgressors; and he was the one who bore the sin of many and will intercede for the transgressors.
Moreover, Yahweh let [it be] made known to me, and I knew. Then you showed me their deeds.
Listen attentively to me, Yahweh, and listen to [the] voice of my opponents.
But Yahweh [is] with me like a powerful warrior. {Therefore} my persecutors will stumble and will not prevail. They will be very ashamed, for they will not achieve success. [Their] {everlasting insult} will not be forgotten.
And in the portico of the gate {were two tables on each side} to slaughter the burnt offering on them and the sin offering and the guilt offering.
And he said to me, "The chambers of the north [and] the chambers of the south which [are] {before} the courtyard, they {are the holy chambers} in which the priests, who [are] near to Yahweh, will eat the {most holy objects}. There they shall put the {most holy objects}, and the grain offering and the sin offering and the guilt offering, for the place [is] holy.
The grain offering and the sin offering and the guilt offering, they themselves may eat them, and [also] all [the] consecrated possessions in Israel will be theirs.
And he said to me, "This [is] the place where the priests will boil the guilt offering and the sin offering, [and] where they shall bake the grain offering [in order] not to bring [them] out to the outer courtyard to make the people holy.
Their heart is false; now they must bear [their] guilt. He himself will break down their altars; he will destroy their stone pillars.
What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten. What the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten. And what the hopping locust left, the destroying locust has eaten.
"I struck you with blight and with mildew. Frequently the cutting locust devoured your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees, yet you did not return to me," [is] the declaration of Yahweh.
Then they will cry to Yahweh, but he will not answer them. He will hide his face from them at that time, when they have made their deeds evil.
"Say to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah: I [am] going to shake the heavens and the earth,
And he asked me, "What [are] you seeing?" And I said, "I [am] seeing a flying scroll twenty cubits long and ten cubits wide."
Then he began to reproach the towns in which the majority of his miracles had been done, because they did not repent:
But the one who did not know and did [things] deserving blows {will be given a light beating}. And from everyone to whom much has been given, much will be demanded, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will ask him [for] even more.
For in this way God loved the world, so that he gave his one and only Son, in order that everyone who believes in him will not perish, but will have eternal life.
Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now you say, 'We see,' your sin remains.
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down {voluntarily}. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take possession of it again. This commandment I received from my Father."
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin. But now they do not have a valid excuse for their sin.
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin. But now they do not have a valid excuse for their sin.
If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father.
If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father.
For by the works of the law {no person will be declared righteous} before him, for through the law [comes] knowledge of sin.
but God demonstrates his own love for us, [in] that [while] we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not charged to one's account [when there] is no law.
What then shall we say? [Is] the law sin? May it never be! But I would not have known sin except through the law, for I would not have known covetousness if the law had not said, "Do not covet."
For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, {sold into slavery to sin}.
Consequently, [there is] now no condemnation for those [who are] in Christ Jesus.
But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, this person {does not belong to him}.
For the flesh desires against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, for these are in opposition to one another, so that whatever you want, you may not do these [things].
among whom also we all formerly lived in the desires of our flesh, doing the will of the flesh and of the mind, and we were children of wrath by nature, as also the rest of [them] were.
because of which the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience,
and to await his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus, the one who delivers us from the coming wrath.
hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles in order that they may be saved, so that [they] always fill up their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the end.
how will we escape [if we] neglect so great a salvation which had [its] beginning [when it] was spoken through the Lord [and] was confirmed to us by those who heard,
For [it is] impossible [concerning] those who have once been enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and become sharers of the Holy Spirit,
How much worse punishment do you think the person will be considered worthy of who treats with disdain the Son of God and who considers ordinary the blood of the covenant by which he was made holy and who insults the Spirit of grace?
who himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that [we] may die to sins [and] live to righteousness, by whose wounds you were healed.
And I saw another great and marvelous sign in heaven: seven angels having seven plagues [that are] the last [ones], because with them the wrath of God is completed.