The gospel in words: 'Natural'

This is a reprint of a previous article.

"The natural man is an enemy to God." (Mosiah 3:19)

The

Oxford English Dictionary has nearly three pages on the word "natural."

A natural person is "one who is morally in a state of nature, in a

purely natural condition, not altered or improved in any way." Natural

matters are things "having their basis in the natural world or in the

usual course of nature."

Natural

things take "place in conformity with the ordinary course of nature;

not unusual, marvelous, or miraculous." People living in a state of

nature are those "without spiritual enlightenment; unenlightened;

unregenerate." These people have a natural inclination or disposition

to follow their own appetites. Natural events or things have "a real or

physical existence, as opposed to what is spiritual, and pertain to or

operate or take place in the physical (as opposed to the spiritual)

world."

This is an enormously

important concept in understanding scripture. It begins in Genesis with

a description of the creation of Adam and Eve, born, as it were, into a

spiritual state constantly in God's presence, and descending into a

natural, unregenerate state, cut off from the presence of God.

Interestingly,

"genesis" and "natural" have the same root, which means to beget, or

give birth. This root is the parent of numerous words such as progeny,

kin, nature, kind (both kinds), pregnant, congenital, innate,