What Is The Sin Against The Holy Spirit | Why Is It Known As The Unforgivable Sin?

One of the most unforgivable sins is actually mentioned in the Mark and Mattew in which the Jesus said I would tell you, people can be forgiven all of their sins and every slander they will utter, but then he also gives one exception that whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.

What Jesus Said ?

Jesus had not been teaching in public for long when his heart had begun to compare him to all of their teachers, called the scribes, which are part of the conservative Jewish group known as the Pharisees. The growing crowds were also astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one who had the authority, not as the scribes.

The scribes did hear that comparison and felt the tension and soon escalated it, as these Bible teachers of the day, with their many other added traditions, quickly grew in their envy and hatred for Jesus. The threat is also so significant these conversations even are willing to easily cross the aisle to conspire with their liberal rivals, the Herodians.

The shadow will come in the Mark. Scribes have descended from Jerusalem to set them straight to the poor, deceived people of the backwater Galilee. They said the Bleezebul also possessed him, and by the prince of the demons, he cast out them.

Jesus calmly answers that they lie with the basic logic and turns it to make a statement about his lordship. Then he will warn these liars, who know much better deep down, of the spiritual danger they are actually in.

Honestly, I will say to you all of the sins will be forgiven by the children of man. Whatever the blasphemies that they mutter, whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness actually, but is guilty of an eternal sin for they were saying, He has an unclean spirit.

It is the only thing to suppose that Jesus is out of his mind. Still, it is another thing to attribute the actual work of the God spirits to the devil – to observe the power of the God unfolding in and through this man Jesus, be haunted by it in the callous heart, and the turn to delude others by ascribing the Spirits work to Satan.

This evidence such as the profound hardness of the heart in these scribes that they should fear they are on the brink of eternal ruin – if you are already too late. Jesus does not necessarily declare that the scribes are already condemned, but he warns them gravely of their precarious positions.

Who did the Scribes Blaspheme?

Before we ask about our sin today, let’s gather the pieces in the Gospels. At this very crucial and so unique point in the redemptive history, all of the teachers of God’s covenant people have God himself will among them.

God’s long-anticipated kingdom is dawning. If it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you”. The very day that their stories, the prophets, and the Scriptures have prepared them for is being unveiled before them, and in their hand and impenitent the hearts, they are just rejecting.

And not only are they cold toward how God is doing it and murmuring about it to each other, but as the teachers of God’s people, they are now speaking up to draw all others away from the truth. And they do so by declaring that the power at work in Jesus, manifestly from God, is the power of Satan. Here Jesus did warn them whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never forgive but is guilty of an eternal sin.

Matthew adds a detail that we do not have in the Mark. Whoever will speak a word against the Son of the man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to become. Therefore, attacking Jesus is the only thing.

He will refer to himself as the Son of the man- God himself, who is among his people but only fully revealed in his death and resurrection. Attacking this enigmatic Son of the man, the Spirit can always overcome that.

But it is also essential to see what God is doing and turn to attack his Spirit. Who is left to help these scribes if they are settling in against the Spirit of God? Insult, dishonor, and to make the enemies with the Spirit, and who is left to bring you back?

The main reason that these scribes are so dangerously close to being guilty of the eternal sin is that they are evidencing such a settled hardness of the heart-not just against this mysterious Son of the man, but now explicitly which is against the Spirit- that their hearts may no longer be capable of the repentance. It is not that they may be genuinely repentant but given the stiff arm. Still, they will never have forgiveness because they will never meet the simple, invaluable, softhearted condition for it.

Is Anyone Unforgivable Today?

When Jesus addresses the scribes in his day, it is on the brink of a seismic redemptive-historical change that will come with his life and ministry. So in what sense might his warning to the scribes about blasphemy against the Spirit be uniquely for Jesus’ day, on the cusp of the old covenant being fulfilled and a new covenant being inaugurated? Should these words fall the same way on our ears twenty centuries later?

When we turn forward in the story to acts and Epistles, we do not have to find blasphemy, which is against the Spirit, which signals our need to exercise care in applying this precise term today. However, we will find a concept similar to the unforgivable sin, even if the terms are not the same.