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Concept
Traducianism
Summary
In Christian theology, traducianism is a doctrine about the origin of the soul holding that this immaterial aspect is transmitted through natural generation along with the body, the material aspect of human beings. That is, human propagation is of the whole being, both material and immaterial aspects: an individual's soul is derived from the soul of one or both parents. This implies that only the soul of Adam was created directly by God (with Eve's substance, material and immaterial, being taken from out of Adam), in contrast with the idea of creationism of the soul, which holds that all souls are created directly by God.
All Church Fathers agreed that the soul of Adam was directly created by God; they disagreed about whether humans thereafter were each given souls as a special act of creation, or whether souls were passed on to them the same way their bodies were. Tertullian actively advocated traducianism, the parental generation of souls. After the rise of Pelagianism, some theologians hesitated between traducianism and creationism, believing the former to offer a better, if not the only, explanation of the transmission of original sin. For Augustine, traducianism suggested a simple explanation for original sin, but he could not decide between it and creationism. In his writing to Saint Jerome, Augustine said, "If that opinion of the creation of new souls is not opposed to this established article of faith let it be also mine; if it is, let it not be thine." Jerome condemned it and said that creationism was the opinion of the Church, but he admitted that most of the Western Christians held traducianism. Gregory of Nyssa alone among the Greek Fathers leaned toward traducianism. Theodore Abu Qurrah, Macarius, Rufinus and Nemesius also favored that view. Clement of Alexandria laid the foundations for the creationist view. Ambrose of Milan drew a distinction between the creation of Eve's body from Adam's rib and the creation of her soul by citing Genesis 2:22: "the man said: "This one, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
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