Eastern Orthodox view of sin

Ancestral sin

The Eastern Orthodox church accepts the teachings of John Cassian and the doctrine of ancestral sin, but not original guilt. Ancestral sin (Greek: προγονικὸν ἁμάρτημα, romanized: progonikon hamartēma, lit. 'ancestral fault') is distinguished from the Western formulation of original sin. Humanity is understood to inherit the consequences of the primordial transgression, namely mortality, corruption, and inclination to sin, instead of guilt based on the actions of Adam. The fall introduces a condition in which human beings are born into a disordered and corruptible existence, without bearing personal culpability for the first sin.

Sources and modern scholarship describe ancestral sin in ontological rather than juridical terms. In Greek patristic tradition, sin is primarily compiled as a state of corruption and separation from God, instead of it being inherited as legal guilt.

Original guilt

However, Orthodox doctrine doesn't affirm original guilt. The Orthodox Church affirms the understanding that humanity inherits sin's consequences and a fallen environment, but explicitly denies inherited guilt or a fallen nature. Kallistos Ware writes that, while human beings inherit the fallen condition marked by morality and corruption, they don't inherit the guilt of Adam's transgression:

Orthodoxy, holding as it does a less exalted idea of the human state before the fall, is also less severe than the west in its view of the consequences of the fall.

John Meyendorff observes that the Greek Fathers didn't develop the concept of inherited guilt characteristic of later Western theology, instead describing the fall in terms of corruption and death affecting human nature. Furthermore, original sin isn't transmitted as personal culpability but as a condition into which each individual is born.

Sexuality

The Eastern Orthodox Church does not hold that sex is inherently sinful, but rather condemns seeing sex as something which can be divorced from the loving act between a married couple.

Marriage

One of the Fathers of the Church, John Chrysostom, in elaborating on the words of Paul the Apostle and writing commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians 7 in his homilies, states that:

But 1 Corinthians 7:8 I say to the unmarried and to widows, it is good for them if they abide even as I: 1 Corinthians 7:9 but if they have not continency let them marry? Do you see the strong sense of Paul how he both signifies that continence is better, and yet puts no force on the person who cannot attain to it; fearing lest some offense arise?

Homosexuality

Despite varying views from different jurisdictions, the Orthodox Church has consistently condemned homosexuality, including notes from the early Church Fathers and Byzantine Empire. Today, they're mostly consistent in agreeing that homosexuality is damaging to the human person and that temptation is an ascetic struggle. Evidence from the New and Old Testament suggests how homosexuality is viewed as sinful, including Romans 1:26-27:

Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

The Orthodox Church in America (OCA) also provides detailed advice on homosexuality in their 1992 10th All-American Council:

Men and women with homosexual feelings and emotions are to be treated with the understanding, acceptance, love, justice and mercy due to all human beings... Persons struggling with homosexuality who accept the Orthodox faith and strive to fulfill the Orthodox way of life may be communicants of the Church with everyone else who believes and struggles.

Idolatry and iconoclasm

Idolatry

In Eastern Orthodox theology, idolatry is defined as the worship (λατρεία) of created objects as though they were divine. The tradition distinguishes this from the veneration (προσκύνησις) accorded to icons, which is directed not to the material object but to the prototype it presents. The Second Council of Nicaea in 787 AD formalized this distinction, affirming that "the honor paid to the image passes the prototype" and thereby rejecting the identification of icon veneration with idolatry.

Patristic and later sources interpret biblical prohibitions such as Exodus 20:4 ("You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below") within the context of pagan idol worship instead of condemnation on sacred images. John of Damascus wrote that the Incarnation establishes the legitimacy of depicting Christ, since the invisible God has become visible in human form. Modern Orthodox scholarship maintains this distinction.

Iconoclasm

This refers to the rejection and destruction of religious images, particularly during the Byzantine Iconoclastic Controversy (c. 726 – c. 843). Imperial policies under Leo III and his successors prohibited the use of icons, leading to sustained theological and political conflict within the Byzantine Empire. The controversy culminated in the restoration of icons in 843, commemorated in the Orthodox Church as the Feast of Orthodoxy.

Theologically, iconoclasm was opposed because it compromised the doctrine of the Incarnation. Iconophile writers, including John of Damascus and Theodore the Studite, argued that the denial of icons implied a denial of Christ's true humanity and visibility. The Seventh Ecumenical Council condemned iconoclasm as a doctrinal error.