traducianism en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- /tɹəˈdjuːsɪənɪz(ə)m/ (UK)
Etymology
Etymology tree English traducian Proto-Indo-European *-id- Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-idyéti Proto-Hellenic *-íd͏̌d͏̌ō Ancient Greek -ῐ́ζω (-ĭ́zō) Proto-Indo-European *-mos Proto-Indo-European *-mós Ancient Greek -μός (-mós) Ancient Greek -ισμός (-ismós)der. English -ism English traducianism From traducian + -ism.
Meanings
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(uncountable) The doctrine that the soul or spirit is inherited from one or both parents.
Tertullian suggested that the human soul is transmitted by parents to their children and is therefore inescapably associated with continuing human sin: this doctrine of ‘traducianism’ underlay the pessimistic view of the human condition and its imprisonment in original sin which was presented in an extreme form by that later theological giant from North Africa, Augustine of Hippo.
2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity, Penguin, published 2010, page 145:Augustine's insistence on its spiritual nature made it hard for him to uphold, along with Tertullian, the doctrine of physical traducianism.
2003, Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason, Penguin (2004), page 37n