The Eastern Orthodox understanding of the nature of fallen humanity is closer to the Latter-day Saint understanding than that of Roman Catholicism and LDS theology, as EO rejects the concept of “Original Sin,” instead opting for what is often called “ancestral sin.”
Eastern Orthodox theologian and protopresbyter, Michael Pomazansky, gave a fair overview of the Augustinian understanding of Original Sin:
Roman Catholic teaching on inherited guilt is based on the works of Blessed Augustine, who wrote: “Even of believing husbands and wives are born guilty persons . . . on account of original sin” (“Treatise against Two Letters of the Pelagians, chap. 11); “The fault of our nature remains in our offspring so deeply impressed as to make it [our offspring] guilty” (“On Original Sin,” chap. 44); “Inasmuch as infants are not held bound by any sins of their own actual life, it is the guilt of original sin which is healed in them by the grace of Him Who saves them by the laver of regeneration [i.e., in Baptism]” (“On the Baptism of Infants,” chap. 24); “Until, then, this remission of sins takes place in the offspring, they have within them the law of sin in such manner, that it is really imputed to them as sin; in other words, with that law there is attaching to them its sentence of guilt, which holds them debtors to eternal condemnation” (“On Marriage and Concupiscence,” chap. 37). This concept of inherited guilt was affirmed at the fifth session of the Council of Trent (1546), which, in defining the Roman teaching on original sin, referred to “the guilt of original sin.” in the 17th and 18th centuries, some Roman Catholic theologians continued to develop Blessed Augustine’s teachings on inherited guilt. However, it was in Protestantism rather than Roman Catholicism that the doctrine of inherited guilt (also known as the doctrine of “imputed sin”) was given its most extreme formulations. (Michael Pomazansky, Orthodox Dogmatic Theology [trans. Hieromonk Seraphim Rose; 3d ed.; Platina, Calif.: St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, 2015], 165 n. 12)
After giving his overview of Roman Catholic theology, Pomazansky then outlines the EO understanding of “ancestral sin”:
Orthodox theology does not accept the extreme points of Blessed Augustine’s teaching; but equally foreign to it is the (later) Roman Catholic point of view, which has a very legalistic, formal character. The foundation of the Roman Catholic teaching lies in (a) an understanding of the sin of Adam as an infinitely great offense against God; (b) after this offense there followed the wrath of God; (c) the wrath of God was expressed in the removal of the supernatural gifts of God’s grace; and (d) the removal of grace drew after itself the submission of the spiritual principal to the fleshly principle, and a falling deeper into sin and death. From this comes a particular view of the redemption performed by the Son of God. In order to restore the order which had been violated, it was necessary first of all to give satisfaction for the offense given to God, and by this means to remove the guilt of mankind and the punishment that weighs upon him.
The consequences of ancestral sin are accepted by Orthodox theology differently.
After his first fall, man himself departed in soul from God and became unreceptive to the Grace of God which was opened to him; he ceased to listen to the Divine voice addressed to him, and this led to the further deepening of sin in him.
However, God has never deprived mankind of His mercy, help, Grace, and especially His chosen people; and from the people there came forth great righteous men such as Moses, Elijah, Elisha, and the later prophets. The Apostle Paul, in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, lists a whole choir of Old Testament righteous ones, saying that they are those of whom the world was not worthy (Heb. 11:38). All of them were perfected not without a gift from above, not without the Grace of God. The book of Acts cites the words of the first martyr, Stephen, where he says of David that he found favor (Grace) before God, and desired to find a tabernacle of the God of Jacob (Acts 7:46)—that is, to build a Temple for Him. The greatest of the prophets, St. John the Forerunner, was filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb (Luke 1:15). But the Old Testament righteous ones could not escape the general lot of fallen mankind after death, remaining in the darkness of hell, until the founding of the Heavenly Church—that is, until the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ destroyed the gates of hell and opened the way into the Kingdom of Heaven.
One must not see the essence of sin—including original sin—only in the dominance of the fleshly over the spiritual, as Roman Catholic theology teaches. Many sinful inclinations, even very serious ones, have to do with qualities of a spiritual order: such, for example, is pride, which, according to the words of the Apostle, is the source, together with lust, of the general sinfulness of the world (I John 2:15-16). Sin is also present in evil spirits who have no flesh at all. In Sacred Scripture the word “flesh” signifies a condition of not being reborn, a condition opposed to being reborn in Christ That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit (John 3:6). Of course, this is not to deny that a whole series of passions and sinful inclinations originate in bodily nature, which Sacred Scripture also shows (Romans, chap. 7).
Thus, original sin is understood by Orthodox theology as a sinful inclination which has entered into mankind and become its spiritual disease. (Ibid., 166-69)
