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INTRODUCTION

At the heart of human rebellion lies a profound paradox: man’s insatiable desire to be like God, yet without God. The first sin in Eden was not merely the eating of a fruit but a grasping at divine prerogatives outside the divine order. Every act of sin since—whether through pride, self-salvation, or the illegitimate pursuit of dominion—echoes this primal rebellion. Scripture, the mystics, and the great commentators alike remind us that sin is not merely a catalogue of wrong actions but a distortion of allegiance: trusting the self for survival where only God can save.

Yet more profoundly, this behaviour is rooted in a consciousness that is not enlightened by the divine. Humanity often does not reach for God because it does not truly perceive God; it acts out of perceived orphanhood, a sense of abandonment or isolation, and attempts to secure life, identity, and authority on its own terms. This spiritual blindness is the soil in which pride, grasping, and the longing for self-salvation take root. Sin, therefore, is not just external disobedience—it is a misorientation of the soul, a failure to see and receive the life that only God offers.

Throughout history, human civilization itself—its political leaders, institutions, and social constructs—can be seen as an extension of this same impulse: an attempt to recreate paradise, impose order, and stave off chaos apart from God. Kings, governments, philosophies, and collective structures often arise from humanity’s fear of vulnerability and desire for control, presenting themselves as saviours of society, yet ultimately failing to address the heart’s need for divine alignment and redemption.

Thus, all of man’s answers to the consequences of the Fall in Genesis 3 are temporary at best, as history testifies. Every empire rises and falls, every law or philosophy proves insufficient, and every human attempt at paradise crumbles because it is built on the foundation of self-reliance rather than God’s provision I.e. grace..

Only what God builds and maintains stands the test of time:

“Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain; unless the LORD protects the city, its watchmen stand guard in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for bread to eat—for He gives sleep to His beloved.” —Psalm 17:1-2

The biblical narrative, beginning with Eden and extending through the lives of figures like Saul and the teachings of Samuel, illuminates this dynamic. Saul’s premature grasping and reliance on self-effort, contrasted with Samuel’s embodiment of divine listening and faithful response, illustrate the recurring tension between human presumption and God’s gracious provision. This tension, reflected in the very etymology of their names, is echoed throughout Scripture and continues to resonate in every human heart that has not yet fully surrendered to God’s guiding presence.

THE ETYMOLOGY OF SIN: “MISSING THE MARK”

Language	Word	Root Meaning	Insight
Hebrew	חָטָא (chata)	“to miss, to go wrong, to forfeit”	Sin is not simply transgression but a deviation from God’s appointed way.
Greek	ἁμαρτία (hamartia)	“to miss the mark, to fail”	Classical Greek used it of an archer missing the target; spiritually, man’s arrows fall short of God’s glory (Rom. 3:23).
Latin	peccatum	related to “stumble”	Suggests falling into a ditch—an image of blindness and error (i.e. because of inebriation)
English	“sin”	Proto-Germanic sundjō “guilt, truth violated”	Retains the moral weight of broken covenant.

As Søren Kierkegaard observed, sin is not simply weakness, but despair—“the refusal to be oneself in God’s truth.” Thus, at the level of essence, sin is a misalignment of the inner yetser (formation, imagination) from the Creator’s design.

Thus, the more we attempt to remedy our suffering in our own strength—our abilities and resources—the more we accentuate it, since we are operating from our innate insufficiency.

PREMATURE GRASPING: THE ROOT OF EDEN

Genesis 3:6 records that Eve “took of its fruit and ate.” The Hebrew verb laqach (לקח), “to seize, take, grasp” implies more than casual acceptance. It is an act of grasping, a seizing of what was not given. Mystics like Augustine called this curvatus in se—the soul turned inward, grasping at good on its own terms.

• Rashi comments on the narrative of Eden that man “hastened before his time,” desiring wisdom without the humility of waiting for God’s revelation.
• Matthew Henry writes, “She would be wiser, but she became a fool. It is our ruin to think ourselves wiser than God.”

This is contrary to Scripture which declares,

“Whoever believes will not be in haste.” —Isaiah 28:16

Sin is not only a premature attempt to gain by force what God intends to give by grace: it is a demonstration of distrust in “someone else” and specifically, a lack of faith in God’s good intent towards mankind.

FORMS OF SIN: THEOLOGICAL CATEGORIES

Category	Description	Scriptural Reference
Premature Grasping	Taking divine gifts before their time or outside their order.	Gen. 3:6; Prov. 20:21
Illegitimate Allegiance	Meeting needs outside of God’s covenant care, binding oneself to idols.	Exod. 20:3; Hosea 2:7
Self-Salvation	Leaning on works, pride, or autonomy instead of Christ.	Gal. 3:3; Eph. 2:8–9
Self-Dominion (Pride)	Claiming sovereignty over life rather than yielding to God.	Isa. 14:13–14
Recreating Paradise	Attempting restoration on human terms, excluding divine redemption.	Gen. 11:4; Rev. 18
Rejection of God’s Offer	Refusal to receive salvation, preferring self-rule.	John 1:11–12; Heb. 2:3

CLASSICAL AND MYSTICAL VOICES

• Plato likened sin to the shadows of the cave: the error of clinging to illusions rather than truth.
• Philo of Alexandria saw hamartia as “the soul missing its own good by chasing a lesser good.”
• Augustine declared: “Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.” Restlessness (exhaustion) is the fruit of grasping without receiving.
• Meister Eckhart wrote: “Man must be emptied of himself (self-reliance), for as long as he stands in his own will, he stands outside of God’s will.” Salvation is only possible when we recognise our own limitations.

SCRIPTURE COMMENTARY

• Romans 10:3 – “For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.”
  • Matthew Henry: “This is the ruin of multitudes—that they seek to patch up a righteousness of their own instead of accepting the robe of Christ.”
• Psalm 127:1 – “Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it.”
  • Human attempts to recreate paradise are vain towers of Babel, they are tombstones and mausoleums of death, not monuments of greatness.
• John 6:28–29 – “What shall we do, that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered… This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.”
  • The only legitimate “work” is the surrender of faith, which is the surrender of the ego’s need to control outcomes. This is the behaviour is the survival instinct of physical nature.

THE SPIRITUAL DYNAMICS OF SIN

1. Sin as Misalignment of Desire – The inner conception bends toward self.
2. Sin as Illegitimate Shortcut – Grasping prematurely what God would freely give in season.
3. Sin as False Dominion – Claiming paradise on human terms rather than entering God’s rest (Heb. 4).
4. Sin as Rejection of Grace – The tragedy of preferring self-salvation to God’s redemption.

SAUL AND THE SIN OF DEMAND

No story embodies “premature grasping” and “self-reliance” more than King Saul in 1 Samuel 13. He could not wait for Samuel to arrive at Gilgal, and so he seized the priestly role, offering a sacrifice unlawfully.

NAME ETYMOLOGIES:

Name	Hebrew	Root Meaning	Spiritual Insight
Saul	שָׁאוּל (Sha’ul)	from sha’al שׁאל, “to ask, demand”	The king Israel demanded, embodying demand and insecurity.
Samuel	שְׁמוּאֵל (Shemu’el)	from shama שמע, “to hear” + El	“Heard of God” — the prophet born of prayer, representing listening and receiving.

• Saul (Demand): Acts from fear of the people, fear of delay, and fear of losing his kingdom, pressing ahead instead of waiting.
• Samuel (Hearing): Embodies the opposite: prayer, patience, listening.

Matthew Henry writes of Saul:

“Those that distrust God’s providence are apt to make haste… Unbelief is at the bottom of all our disobedience.”

Rashi observes that Saul “hastened before his time,” usurping Samuel’s role and thereby forfeiting God’s blessing.

And because he takes matters into his own hands, as opposed to leaving them in God’s hands, he causes the very thing he fears.

SAUL, SAMUEL, AND SHEOL

The drama deepens when we see the linguistic web between Saul, Samuel, and Sheol:

Word	Hebrew	Root	Meaning
Saul (Sha’ul)	שָׁאוּל	sha’al	“asked for, demanded”
Samuel (Shemu’el)	שְׁמוּאֵל	shama + El	“heard of God / God has heard” i.e. God’s answer.
Sheol (She’ol)	שְׁאוֹל	sha’al	“the grave, the place that demands all”

• Saul (Sha’ul) and Sheol (She’ol) share the same root: sha’al = “demand.” (All spelled שאול).
• Sheol is the insatiable abyss that never stops asking, demanding (Prov. 30:15–16).
• Saul’s life ends in Sheol—he consults a medium to summon Samuel from Sheol (1 Sam. 28), collapsing into the very demand-driven abyss he embodied.
• Samuel (Shemu’el), by contrast, represents shama—hearing and God’s gracious answer. To “shama” is the spiritual practice of declaring trust in God’s salvation and rejecting reliance on self for the same.

Thus the narrative is almost prophetic theatre: Sha’ul (demand) descends to She’ol (insatiable demand), because he rejected Shemu’el (God’s hearing and answer). Saul failed to wait for God’s answer represented by Samuel and so loses the kingdom given to him. When we do what he did, the same happens to us and we are left to our own devices.

“Listen to me…. If you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you.” —2 Chronicles 15:2

NEW TESTAMENT FULFILMENT

• Saul of Tarsus (symbolising sheol, the abyss, death, or the grave) likewise persecuted God’s anointed (the church), echoing King Saul’s pursuit of David.
• His zeal by law was a form of self-salvation—demanding the kingdom on human terms.
• But on the Damascus road, he is stopped by a voice from heaven: “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” (Acts 9:4).
• In that moment, Saul (demand) encounters Samuel’s God (the God who hears) and is transformed.
• He is delivered from Sheol (the way of demand) into salvation (the way of hearing and receiving grace). And Saul become Paul.

THE CHOICE SET BEFORE US

• To live like Saul is to demand, grasp, control—a path that ends in Sheol because it aligns with Sheol..
• To live like Samuel is to hear, pray, wait, and receive God’s answer in God’s perfect timing.
• To live in Christ is to go beyond Samuel, for He is the greater One who was raised from Sheol itself (Acts 2:27). In Him, Sheol’s insatiable demand is broken forever.

OUTRO: THE ROOT OF SIN

When we trace the linguistic and theological web, sin emerges not first as action but as posture: the refusal to wait on God’s answer, illegitimate allegiances, leaning on auto-salvation through work and earning, the pride of self-dominion and the attempt to recreate paradise on man’s subjective and erroneous terms.

Ultimately, sin is rejecting God’s offer of salvation, redemption, and restoration. In Saul we see the pattern: to grasp at kingship without waiting for God’s voice is to step towards Sheol. In Samuel we see the antidote: to trust that God hears and God answers.

The question for us remains: will we live as Saul, demanding, or as Samuel, waiting for God’s answer? Only the latter path opens into life, restoration, and the true reign of God in our lives.

MEDITATION VERSES

“Whoever believes will not be in a rush.” —Isaiah 28:16

“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eyes, and that it was desirable for obtaining wisdom, she took [grasped, seized illegally] the fruit and ate it. She also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate it.” —Genesis 3:6

“Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again.” —Exodus 14:13

DEVOTIONAL PRAYER

Lord of mercy and truth,
Deliver me from the temptation to grasp before You give,
to trust my works instead of Your grace,
to build my own kingdom rather than receive Your Kingdom.
Empty me of pride, and fill me with Christ,
that I may not miss the mark,
but walk in the way everlasting.
Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION

1. Where in my life am I prematurely grasping rather than waiting on God’s timing?
2. What needs am I tempted to meet illegitimately, outside God’s covenant promises?
3. How do I subtly rely on my own works rather than Christ’s finished work?
4. In what ways do I attempt to recreate paradise on my own terms?
5. How can I more fully receive God’s offer of salvation without resistance?