Smacked in my face

[junipersky]

I'm grading these tests and I just stumbled across something I never realized before.

Most Mormons assume children /cannot/ sin before the age of eight. I think this misconception comes from the solid understanding we have that Satan cannot touch the hearts of children before the age of accountability. But this doesn't mean they cannot transgress God's law. They can! However, their sins are already forgiven them by the power of the Atonement because they are innocent and do not yet have enough light and knowledge to be able to know a) what the laws are and b) apply them successfully in their lives.

So, children can sin. Children are not held accountable for their sins till after the age of accountability. (We hold this to be age eight, however, I'm sure when Judgment day comes the Lord will have a much more individualized specification for when this age was.)

Comments

[cheyinka]

Interesting; so "the age of accountability" is the age at which your sins are imputed to you? I am relatively certain that for Catholics if you haven't reached the age of reason you can't freely choose to do something wrong, and thus actually can't sin at all.

(For Catholics, an action must be chosen for it to be a sin, though knowingly putting oneself in a situation where a wrong action could occur by accident or negligence is itself a sin. I can think of a couple examples of "near occasions of sin": A guy who knows he's an angry drunk drinks anyway - even if he doesn't hurt anyone he's still putting himself in a situation where he might; anyone, ever, pretending to shoot anyone else with a real gun - even if it really isn't loaded and the safety really is on and the trigger really is never pulled that's still a situation where someone could be killed; for some people spending the night with someone they're dating is a near occasion of sin even if nothing inappropriate actually happens.)

[junipersky]

Let's just say this is the interpretation I'm putting on this, and it makes sense. A child killing someone /is/ a sin, but it is taken care of already so they are forgiven.

If I was to think of a situation, let's say that you're going to school. You steal a pencil from the teacher's box. However, you find out later that the box was there for you to take one. You did mean to steal it, and most likely you knew you were stealing it. But it isn't a sin because it was there for you to use in the first place.

Does that make sense? The intent is still there, but the consequences don't exist?

Again, not /Mormon/ doctrine. Just my personal exegesis of these scriptures.

[cheyinka]

It makes sense. It's just different than what I believe, so I wanted to be sure I was understanding you correctly.

For us, it's not that the small child's sin is already forgiven, it's that the small child's action is not a sin. This makes it somewhat less simple, because counter-examples in either direction can be found, either of a younger child obviously and unquestionably having the capacity to freely choose an action, or an older child or even an adult not having this capacity, or not being able to demonstrate it in the case of nonverbal individuals. But it works well enough as a general guideline. In any event if, say, a six year old presented herself to her pastor and requested any of the sacraments, there would be no reason to deny her. (Barring, of course, marriage and holy orders!)

Would the same be the case for you? If a six or seven year old child went to her ward bishop and requested that he make an exception and baptize her early, is there any necessary reason why that couldn't be done?

[junipersky]

I'm not sure. But I'm pretty sure that there would be a 'no', not till you are eight.