To say that the whole human race is burdened with the...

To say that the whole human race is burdened with the heredity of the improper action of Adam and Eve is to say that the thousands of human generations share with Adam and Eve the responsibility of their action, and that they are condemned by God for a mistake which occurred before the birth of any of those generations. This, of course, is inconsistent with God's justice. A human judge does not condemn a son for the sin of his parents which he did not share.

How can we conceive that the Just God places the iniquity of the parents on their children or their great-grandchildren? Therefore, Islam emphatically denies the Doctrine of the Original Sin, and considers every human being pure at the time of his birth and free of any sin. Actually, Islam offers the human infant as a perfect example of a pure and sinless being.

Every human being, according to the teachings of Islam, is born pure and free of any sin and continues to be pure until he commits a sin as an adult. By sinning at the age of adulthood, the individual loses his purity, but a person can regain it through a sincere repentance. When a person genuinely changes his attitude and sincerely intends not to repeat his sin, and truly pledges obedience to God, the Most Merciful will forgive and erase the sin.

Wilson : Let me digress for a moment: Adam and Eve were individuals like us. Let us assume that they repented sincerely after they made a mistake. Does that mean that their mistake was erased? Chirri : If you assume that Adam had repented after he did the improper, you will not be wrong. Nor will you be mistaken if you believe that Adam was forgiven by God upon his repentance.

The Holy Qur'an informs us that the Most Merciful accepted the repentance of Adam, and by this, the action of Adam was forgiven: “…and Adam received from his Lord words, and He relented towards him. Lo! He is the Relenting, the Merciful.” 2:37 Wilson : If Adam was forgiven, why was he expelled from the paradise of God? Chirri : The fall of Adam from paradise is not necessarily a punishment for a sin. It may be a necessary result of the change of his status.

At the beginning, Adam was worthy of communicating with God at any time, and this was his bliss and paradise. By acting improperly, he became susceptible to slip again; that is, he had lost his immunity from impropriety. So unimmuned, he was no longer in such a high position that enables him to communicate with his Lord at any time.