Voluntary and Involuntary Sin

We pray for forgiveness from sins, voluntary and involuntary. But what does that contrast come to?

Doing something involuntarily admits of at least two different understandings: (1) A person could be compelled to do something that he would not ordinarily voluntarily do because of an “external” cause: recall Aristotle’s example of the man who throws his goods overboard during a severe storm at sea. In such a case, the man knows what he is doing, and in a sense he is the agent of his action, but he nonetheless does what he knows he is doing under duress. (2) A person might do something without (fully) knowing what he does: recall Oedipus’ sleeping with Jocasta. He takes himself to know what he is doing—he is sleeping with his wife. And, while that is true, it is also true that he is sleeping with his mother–but he doesn’t know he is doing that. He doesn’t know he is sleeping with his mother, but do it under duress. He is under no duress; he is instead ignorant of a description under which his action falls. Note that there are a variety of ways in which such ignorance may occur, and the varieties each make a difference to how we understand and evaluate what is done and/or the doer of it. For example, a person may be ignorant of a description under which his action falls because he is so impassioned as to make no use of readily available time for deliberation (the person’s actions are like those of a drunkard); or, a person may be ignorant of a description because, even though it is in some sense in his mental purview, he only ‘half-recognizes’ it as a genuine description of what he is doing (such a person’s actions would, in some ways, resemble the “actions” of a somnambulant). Oedipus’ case is different still, since it is unclear how he could have come to know before acting the other description under which he acts. When he comes to know the description, he repents for what he has done (pardon the understatement); and that repentance helps shape the way we evaluate him, or should. (“Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” “Now when they heard this they were pricked in their heart; and they said unto Peter and the rest of the apostles: Men and brethren, what shall we do?”)

So when we pray for forgiveness for involuntary sins, we pray for forgiveness primarily for those things we have done, and done (in one sense) voluntarily (we knowingly chose to do them under a description), but in ignorance of (other) descriptions under which those things are sinful. Eve plausibly provides an example of involuntary sin. When she looks at the tree, plucking and eating fruit from it seems to fall under a description on which doing so is good: the tree looks good for food, pleasant to the eyes, and makes one wise. So she plucks and eats from it under that description. Satan’s wiles consist in getting this description to eclipse the description under which God presents the tree to Eve (and Adam): the tree is good for death.

I worry that sometimes we understand ‘involuntary’ to mean yet something else: (3) Doing something involuntarily means doing it without choosing to do it under any description. Imagine that someone overpowers me and then throws me from atop a building, killing an enemy below. My involvement would be involuntary: no choice is involved at all. But in (1) and (2) choice is involved. In (1) the person chooses but under duress; in (2) the person chooses but in ignorance of the description under which what is chosen is sinful. The presence of choice seems to be what requires repentance, where repentance is required. In (3), no choice is involved, and so it is unclear whether such a case could really count as an involuntary sin. As I said, when we pray for forgiveness for involuntary sin, it is primarily involuntary sin as in (2). Perhaps we may also occasionally pray for forgiveness for involuntary sins as in (1), but primarily it is for involuntary sins as in (2).