is about the resurrection of the body. Adam and his seed did not die physically because of his sin being imputed, but simply because God took away the Tree of Life, that man should not have to live for ever in violence and unhappiness. Had not God done this, Adam and his children would have gone on eating of the Tree of Life and so would have lived for ever: but Eternal Life in the violence which was the outcome of Adam's sin would have been no blessing. As the years went by Adam must have been shocked and frightened at what "one little sin" had produced!24 The first physical death that men experience is because Adam by his sin deprived them of their perfect food, without which the human body falls into decay and death (cf. Rev. 22,2). So even innocent babies may die before doing good or evil. The second time men lose their bodies, in the Lake of Fire, is for their own sin, after they have been raised to life in the second resurrection.25 If this verse were to refer to the soul and spirit, it would force us to believe in universal Salvation! Note that it does not say "all in Adam", but "in Adam all": and so not "all in Christ", but "in Christ all": first Christ Himself, then they that are Christ's, then "the dead" at the second Resurrection (1 Cor. 15,23).

N.B. 3. Romans 5,12 is, quaintly enough, often quoted to prove the very opposite of its plain meaning. The verse states that, although sin and death came into the world through Adam, they passed through to his descendants not because Adam sinned but because all sinned. In other words "the soul that sinneth it shall die", and all men with the single exception of "the man Christ Jesus", have like a flock of sheep followed Adam's bad example and suffered the same fate.26

The death of every man's body is due to the absence of the tree of life, caused by Adam's sin: the death of every man's spirit is due to his own sin, not that of Adam. So even the Christian Saint, whose sins are forgiven through the blood of Jesus, yet dies physically through lack of the tree of life: but this is a blessing; for who wants to be burdened for ever with flesh which derives from Adam, and is a constant source of trouble and temptation?27

Up to the time of Christ's Resurrection physical death carried with it spiritual death, and saint and sinner alike