khawtaw
Definition
Khawtaw (Hebrew חָטָא, hāṭāʾ) is the primary Hebrew verb for “sin” — translated as “to sin” or “sin” in over 400 biblical passages — and means literally “to miss the mark” or “to fail to reach a goal.” In Jones’ hamartology, this etymology carries theological weight: sin is not an innate corrupt character (contra the Augustinian infusion theory) but a structural failure arising from mortality. Those who are mortal miss the goal of their creation — the image of God, the restoration of dominion, and glory. Khawtaw thus describes the fallen condition as an ontological deficit, not as moral depravity in the sense of an infused sinful nature.
Usage in the corpus
Stephen E. Jones
Jones cites the etymology of khawtaw as the hamartological starting point of his system in Creation’s Jubilee. This etymology is for Jones not a linguistic curiosity but a theological program: if “sin” originally means “missing the mark,” then the question of the goal is more fundamental than the question of the transgression. The theological agenda shifts thereby from guilt-processing to goal-restoration. Khawtaw hamartology makes Jones’ universalism structurally intelligible: if sin is ontological deficit, it can be ontologically resolved — and God, as the Creator who set the goal, has both the obligation and the capacity to remove that deficit. Jones formulates this technically:
“The Hebrew word for ‘sin’ is khawtaw. It is translated ‘sin’ in over 400 Bible passages. Yet the word literally means ‘to miss the mark,’ or ‘to fail to reach a goal.‘”
[Jones, Creation’s Jubilee, ch. 13]
Jones connects khawtaw directly to his core thesis — that people sin (miss the mark) because they are mortal, and are mortal because Adam’s guilt was imputed to them, not infused. This is a deliberately anti-Augustinian position: the Augustinian infusion theory (sin as an infused corruption of human nature inherited through reproduction) makes restoration to the image of God inherently laborious and incomplete in this life. Jones’ imputation doctrine makes it more radical: the mortality condition is juridically imposed, not biologically embedded, and can be juridically lifted. In Creation’s Jubilee he formulates the causal chain:
“Man sins because he is mortal. He is mortal because God made him liable for the original sin of his father Adam. Therefore, God is the direct cause of man’s weak (mortal) condition and the indirect cause of his personal sins.”
[Jones, Creation’s Jubilee, ch. 13]
The etymology of khawtaw is for Jones more than a linguistic curiosity: it confirms that sin is functional deficit — missing the creational goal (the radah mandate, the image of God, glory) — and not a fundamental corruption of human nature as such. Restoring “the missing” is therefore not a laborious moral improvement of a essentially corrupt nature, but the removal of the mortality condition that causes the missing. This foundation undergirds Jones’ universalist restorationism: if sin is structural deficit, it can be structurally resolved — through Christ’s first work (covering of sin), the second work (actual removal), and ultimately through the great Jubilee (universal cancellation of all debt).