Again, the origin of lust is ascribed to the cosmos (1 Jn 2^*""). It is whatever is opposed to the will of God. So in Tit 2^^ -^e read of ' worldly lusts ' (cf. 2 P 1% The world is the ' lust of the flesh,' the ' lust of the eyes,' and the ' pride of life.' It is the kingdom of evil as organized in customs and tendencies in human society and human hearts, in- cluding also evil spirits. It is found in man as the desii-es of the ' flesh and mind ' (Eph 2^), and specifi- cally called the lusts of men (1 P 4-). It might appear as if this ascription of lust to the ' world ' destroyed personal responsibility, but such is never the case. The law of God recognized by man as good, i.e. as the law of his own conscience (Ro V^-), is against such lust, and the Christian command is to love God and do His will. The fact of responsi- bility is not proportional to ability in the NT, and so redemption is always regarded as primarily of grace.
Similarly, and characteristically, the origin of lust is ascribed to the flesh, i.e. the sinful person- ality as apart from God. The ' lusts of the flesh ' mean much more than sensuality. ' It was not the corruptible flesh that made the soul sinful, but the sinful soul that made the flesh corrupt' (Aug., dc Civ. Dei, xiv. 2, 3). It is true that the body [auiixa.) with its desires (Ro 6^^) was a sort of armoury where sin got its weapons, but the body as such is not the originative seat of evil ; otherwise St. Paul's view of the Resurrection would be meaningless. Platonism looked on the body as the tomb of the soul and as pressing down the soul (cf. 1 Co 9-'), but Rothe is scarcely warranted in making the sensuous nature the primary root of evil (Theol. Ethik'\ 1870, ii. 181-7).
Again, the heart is viewed as the origin of evil desires (Ro 1^'* ; cf. Sir 5'-). This centres the origin in man's personality as a whole, not in any one part of the personality. But it is the personality apart from God. So we read in Jude not only ' their own desires,' but also (v.^**) ' their own desires of im- pieties,' i.e. evil desires originating in their im- pious state. A similar thought is found in Ro I-''"'' (cf. Tit 2^^). Evil tendencies develop 'pari passu with God's judicial withdrawal.
LUST
LYCAONIA
725
It might thus appear that those who make selfishness {(piXavrla) the root of sinful desires are nearest the truth. Philo does so and Plato. ' Tlie truth is that the cause of all sins in every person and every instance is excessive self-love' (Laws, v. 731); but in the NT the 'self is not an entity that can be understood aj)art from the redemption of Christ, and the Christian personality is so com- plex that Ave cannot safely limit to any single strand the origin of sin. What the NT is concerned with is not the origin — an insoluble problem — but the abolition of evil desires. Man himself is the moral origin, and the great question is how to redeem sinful man. In other words, these questions are discussed not from the point of view of genetic psychology but from the point of view of redemp- tion.
(2) Groioth and goal of hist. — St. James gives a graphic picture of how i-mdvixla develops. She is pic- tured as a harlot enticing man. Like the fisherman she baits her hook, and traps her jjrey as the hunter does. Then sin is produced, and sin completed brings forth death. It is clearly stated that ' lust ' is not of God. It is man's own, and the inference is that man can resist it. There is no mention of God's grace in the specific Christian sense, although in v.i^ we seem to have this sti'ongly emphasized. Perhaps the writer loosely holds both the Jewish notion of free-will as itself sufficient to resist desire, and the Christian sense of God's grace. It is pos- sible to restrict the whole passage (P^"") to sexual lust, but the wider sense is probable.
Clement of Rome (Ep. ad Cor. iii.) gives a long list of evil desires leading to death, but to Mm strife and envy are characteristically causative of this result, as in the case of Cain (iv.). In the Apostol. Clnirch Order (ed. Schali', p. 242), lust is pictured as a female demon. It leads to fornica- tion, and it darkens the soul so that it cannot see the truth clearly (cf. Bo l-***^-)-
St. Peter associates lust with ignorance (1 P 1^^) and St. Paul with deceit, the opposite of 'truth' (Eph 422)_ Since the time of Plato desire has been regarded by philosophers as aiming at a good (true or false). The end is always viewed sub specie boni. This is an aspect which the NT does not emphasize. But it does say that evil desires leave the soul unsatisfied and produce disorder (Ja 4^). It is possible to be always seeking some new thing and never coming to the knowledge of the truth (2 Ti 3®^')- Knowledge alone is not sufficient, however, for St. Paul regards the law as both revealing desire and intensifying it (Ro V). Redemption is necessary to cope with evil desires.