Therefore all men are conceived in sin, and by nature children of wrath, incapable of saving good, prone to evil, dead in sin, and in bondage thereto, and without the regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit they are neither able nor willing to return to God, to reform the depravity of their nature, nor to dispose themselves to reformation (Canons of Dordt, III/IV, 3).
(I)
Prof. Homer C. Hoeksema
[Source: The Voice of Our Fathers: An Exposition of the Canons
of Dordrecht (RFPA, 2013), p. 268]
Some [who believe in common
grace] view “prone” as a soft term that means that the natural man does not
always do the evil, but is inclined toward evil. However, the meaning is the
opposite and implies that all men are in their natures given over completely to
the evil—to think the evil, to will the evil, to delight in the evil, and to do
the evil. Out of such men no good can ever arise. They are evil in the
mainspring of their existence. Their entire nature is bent in the direction of
evil. They have an irresistible propensity for evil. They cannot rest until
they have committed evil. Such are all men. The manifestation of this proneness
to evil differs according as men differ from one another. All men do not commit
the same sins. They do not have the same character, do not live at the same
time and in the same circumstances, do not possess the same means, the same
opportunities, the same gifts and talents. But in them all, regardless of their
individual differences, is that proneness to evil. All necessarily bring forth
the evil fruit of sin in one form or another.
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(II)
More to come! (DV)
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