Are all sins equal?

Question

What I mean is:
Is stealing a car different from stealing a pencil?
Is murdering a child worse than killing an old person?
Is attacking a clergyman worse than hurting someone else?

If possibly, please explain the logic and/or biblical knowledge that you used to come to your conclusion.

Is murdering the Pope worse than missing church?

Answer 1

All sin is the same. Sin is what takes us futher from Christ. Sin is what keeps those who are lost from seeing the truth. No matter the sin its all the same in God's eyes.

Answer 2

Some sins are greater in their effects than others. Obviously killing someone has a greater impact on the dead person and his family then say stealing his money. So, yes, I must say that some sins are heavier than others.

But all sin - great or small - will come under judgment. every person will be judged according to his or her own deeds, words and thoughts. The rule or standard that will be applied is the amount of light each person has received in this life. The general principle is: the more light received, the greater the accountability; the lesser light possessed, the lesser the accountability. Jesus was very clear on this:
"From everyone who has been given much, much will
be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."(Lk. 12: 48; NIV)

Every circumstance which either aggravates a person’s guilt, and every circumstance which mitigates or palliates it will have due consideration. Because of the principle that one’s deeds will be judged according to the amount of light given, there will be degrees in punishment at the last judgment.

Answer 3

We are all equal at the foot of the Cross by Gods law , But mans laws are diffrent , Stealing a pencil is petty theft where as stealing a car is a felony , Murder is just plain wrong unless in self defense , Man Im sure would feel diffrent about the Clergy than say a homeless bum on the street

Answer 4

Of course all sins are not equal. If common sense isn't sufficient to tell you that stealing a pencil is not equivalent to murder, see what the Bible has to say about it.

Jesus told Pilate, "You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin." (John 19:11) How could someone have "the greater sin" if all sin is the same in God's eyes?

John writes: "If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this. All unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not leading to death." (1 John 5:16-17)

John says some sins are deadly while others are not. Obviously sins leading to spiritual death are worse than sins which do not have this effect. This is what the Christian Church has taught from the beginning. The English word meaning "leading to death" is "mortal". A mortal wound is a wound that leads to death. Which is why the Christian Church calls such deadly sins "mortal sins". John goes on to say that sins which are not mortal are easily forgiven, just a prayer asking for forgiveness will do. The English word meaning "easily forgiven" is "venial". Which is why the Christian Church calls such lesser sins "venial sins". Also implied in this passage is the fact that something more is required for forgiveness of mortal sins. Just a personal prayer to God will not be sufficient. What is required of course is sacramental confession, which is how mortal sins have been forgiven since apostolic times.
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Answer 5

Because you have used the word sin instead of the word crime, I would like to sugest that an act is sinful only in reference to God's demands for Holiness. That being the case, all sinful acts are equal in so far as they share the same root cause - Man's sinful nature.

Whether that rebellious nature manifests itself in the form of invisible victimless crimes (eg premarital sex or sexual perversion) or outright outrage, the Bible seems to indicate that God is as concerned with out insides as out. And it isn't a question of degrees either.

Despite a wide array of laws, a cursory reading of the Deuteronicals seems to prescribe but a single kind of guilt/sin offering for the unintentional breaking of any of them. Or if the person shows regret.

A good analogy might be the flu virus. One person may manifest the disease by sneezing while another runs a fever. Regardless, the prescription is the same.

In the new testament, Jesus seems to makes no distinction between the gravity of an individual's sin in that He readily forgave all who sought healing and forgiveness.

Finally if you accept that Jesus' blood washes away all our sin, without which NONE of our sins could be cleasnsed, than the logical conclusion is that all sin is equal.

Answer 6

It is always difficult and dangerous to attempt to list sins according to their degree of seriousness. In one sense, all sins are equal in that they all separate us from God. The Bible's statement, "For the wages of sin is death ..." (Romans 6:23), applies to all sin, whether of thought, word, or deed.

At the same time, it seems obvious that some sins are worse than others in both motivation and effects and should be judged accordingly. Stealing a loaf of bread is vastly different than exterminating a million people. Sins may also differ at their root. Theologians have sought for centuries to determine what the essence of sin is. Some have chosen sensuality, others selfishness, and still others pride or unbelief. In the Old Testament, God applied different penalties to different sins, suggesting variations in the seriousness of some sins. A thief paid restitution; an occult practitioner was cut off from Israel; one who committed adultery or a homosexual act or cursed his parents was put to death (see Exodus, chapter 22 and Leviticus, chapter 20).

In the New Testament Jesus said it would be more bearable on the day of judgment for Sodom than for Capernaum because of Capernaum's unbelief and refusal to repent at His miracles (Matthew 11:23-24). The sins of Sodom were identified in Ezekiel 16:21 as arrogance, gluttony, indifference to the poor and needy, haughtiness, and "detestable things." When Jesus spoke of his second coming and judgment, he warned that among those deserving punishment some would "be beaten with many blows" and others "with few blows" (Luke 12:47-48). He also reserved His most fierce denunciations for the pride and unbelief of the religious leaders, not the sexually immoral (Matthew 23:13-36).

However, remember that whether our sins be relatively small or great, they will place us in hell apart from God's grace. The good news is that Jesus paid the penalty for our sins and the sins of the whole world at the Cross. If we will repent and turn to Jesus in faith, our sins will be forgiven, and we will receive the gift of eternal life.

Answer 7

Sin is a religious term. It is defined as anything that is an affront to the particular supernatural being you happen to pay homage to. In many religions, all sin is equal and all punishment is the same. Whether you steel a pencil or kill a nun, you're doomed to scream in agony in hell for all eternity. In a secular society based on laws, the punishment is proportionate to the crime. This is one of the dozens of absurdities that lead intelligent, thinking people to deny the possibility that any of those religions are valid.

Answer 8

In one way all sins are equal. They all separate us from a holy and perfect God.

However the amount of human pain caused by a given act of sin certainly is different and the earthly consequences are different as well. The damage done to the soul of the person who commits the sin seems to be different, too.

In the final evaluation, all sin can be forgiven through faith in the life and death of Jesus Christ, but this doesn't mean that there aren't costs and consequences of different levels in this life for those who murder a child or kill a clergyman.

for more info...http://www.billygraham.org/SH_StepsToPeace.asp

Answer 9

No one sin is greater or lesser than another. All sins are equal in the eyes of God. He will not look upon sin or the sinner.He will not have anything to do with the uncleaned.
Murder is murder ,stealing is stealing and violence is violence not matter what mortal man may measure it by. These are unrighteous acts against God's word.

Answer 10

All sins are equal because none of them actually exist outside of the mind that thinks it is seeing them.

The first thing that someone should be considering is whether the idea of sin is actually real.

If God is supposed to be perfect how could She have made anything or anyone that wasn't perfect.
Think about it. The idea of sin assumes certain things about God that seem highly unlikely.

First it assumes a God who is too incompetent to organize a simple educational field excursion and figure out a way to get all of the students home safely.

How likely is this that God would not be smart enough to come up with a plan for our salvation that is going to work?

It also assumes that God must have created us imperfect if we are sinners.

One might assume that God would be able to create someone perfect each and every time if he chose to. Assuming God is capable of this, then it follows logically that we must be perfect creations if we are actually creations of this perfect God.

Unless of course you are saying that God chose to create us imperfect.

If God created us imperfect then anything that may go wrong is Gods fault, not ours. This seems a bit illogical at best so I think that we need to assume that What God creates would have to be perfect.

If this is the case and Gods creations are perfect, then nothing that we can do could change what God created perfect and make it imperfect unless we think that we are more powerful than God is.

How likely is it that we the creation could be more powerful than the creator. I personally find this idea somewhat amusing, and a bit absurd.

Religion tells us that God is perfect. If this is true then it could hardly be logically for Gods creations to be considered to be anything less than perfect.

If this is the case and we are perfect creations of a perfect God then Nothing that we can ever do could possibly change this perfection that God willed, unless we were so powerful that our choices could override and change the will of God.

How likely is that????

Think about it.

The idea of sin is simple nonsense; a lie made up about God by religion.

Love and blessings
don

Source --- Course in miracles

Answer 11

Yes, sins are equal. Ephesians says: For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. (NIV) So the record is clean. Consider this example: You're not doing very well in school and your teacher tells you your marks: C, C, C, D, F, D, C. The next day you gt your report card and it's straight A's. Jesus sits beside you. He has your marks. The point of it, is that Jesus took everyone's sins. Not just mine. Not just yours. Everyone's. Even the sins that didn't happen. HOLY AND BLAMELESS. The sins are equal. But you don't need to worry because they aren't yours anymore. You got all that?