Is Human Weakness a Flaw?

Is Human Weakness a Flaw?

Before answering that we must first describe just what a flaw is.  The dictionary describes flaws as imperfections, a weak point in something manufactured, a mistaken effort to create something we had control in the construction of and failed.  

When we look at the human species and see more flaws than we would care to look upon, who or what can the blame be attributed to?  

“God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them.”  (Gn 1: 27). 

“God looked at everything he had made, and he found it very good.”  (Gn 1: 31).

Here we see a dichotomy as to the creation of something that is seen to have imperfections and we do not destroy it.  Did God create man with weaknesses that could not be considered pure?  Let’s take a look at the most essential elements of the human characteristics that identify us as perfect in the eyes of God.  God created the beasts of the air, earth, and sea.  Which of them has a free will?  Can any of them perform irreverently and then seek forgiveness?  Which of them has been endowed with an immortal soul?  Of course the answer to all is none.  Yet, they fly, roam, and swim the oceans without a care as they are there for our use in a lifegiving need.  

So, what about the weakness each of us has acquired as life presents too many obstacles that create an opportunity to look upon, touch to our pleasures, and then once secured feel the shame of a human flaw we didn’t expect?

The reality of human weakness was neither a mistake, nor an imperfection that God forgot the pattern when creating each of us since we were created in his image, in his likeness. 

Where then does the answer lie as to, “Is Human Weakness a Flaw?”  We must look to the Passion of Christ as to how weakness in the Incarnated Person of Jesus through the weakness of his humanity brought about our redemption.  Through our own weakness we failed because of sin and sought forgiveness.  Without the weakness of our lives we would not have found the reason God sent his Son to save us.  What did Jesus tell Paul when he was plagued by weakness that God would not remove?  “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”  (2 Cor 12: 9).

At the Easter Vigil and with the Exultet it says; “O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer”  All of this was already the answer of the query of human weakness is not a flaw, but the very manner that our failure has become the ticket to find our way to heaven and the Trinity of God for all eternity.

Ralph B. Hathaway