Romans 3:23, is "All" an absolute?

Fidelibus said:

I have been contemplating starting a thread for a while now on this Scripture passage. Conversing with a couple other posters recently on a different thread about this very topic decided my reason for doing so. My reason being is, when it comes to the belief of Catholics like myself, and our belief and defense of the sinlessness of The Blessed Virgin Mary, most non- Catholics Protestants, post Romans 3:23 (Among a couple others) immediately saying "No, Mary was not sinless, for it says right here in Romans 3:23, (KJV version) "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." When pressed on it, the result is pretty much unanimous among Sola Scripturist/Bible only believers. That being, yes...... when this passage says 'all' in Scripture, it absolutely means 'all' have sinned, yes 'all' is an absolute, without question, all means all!

So,,,, I am putting the question out there to my fellow Catholics and our Protestant, Bible only believing brethren ...... Is the word 'All" in Romans 3:23 an absolute, does 'ALL' absolutely mean "ALL"? I say no....... 'all' in Romans is not an absolute.
Looking forward to all (no pun intended he-he) responses.

Have a Blessed Day

Click to expand...

Because Mary experienced death. It contradicts one major huge event that everyone here accepts. Mary died. We have two witnesses to this truth every Christian won't deny, Moses and Ezekiel. Here are their words: Ezekiel 18:20 "The soul that sinneth, it shall die: the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." Genesis 2:17 "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

As a human response I would state, unless Mary comes out waving in Vatican City tomorrow, I'm not buying into the Mary was sinless narrative.

Norbert L said:

Because Mary experienced death. It contradicts one major huge event that everyone here accepts. Mary died. We have two witnesses to this truth every Christian won't deny, Moses and Ezekiel. Here are their words: Ezekiel 18:20 "The soul that sinneth, it shall die: the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." Genesis 2:17 "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

As a human response I would state, unless Mary comes out waving in Vatican City tomorrow, I'm not buying into the Mary was sinless narrative.

Click to expand...

I think Catholics believe she was taken to heaven in a similar way as Elijah.

Norbert L said:

Because Mary experienced death.

Click to expand...

So did Jesus, but at least His sinlessness is made absolutely and abundantly clear, and it's made absolutely clear as to how and why He died.

Good addition to the thread.

zoidar said:

I think Catholics believe she was taken to heaven in a similar way as Elijah.

Click to expand...

Seems the ideology is taking arguments from silence to the extreme.

GDL said:

Seems the ideology is taking arguments from silence to the extreme.

Click to expand...

I will agree with that.

Fidelibus said:

I have been contemplating starting a thread for a while now on this Scripture passage. Conversing with a couple other posters recently on a different thread about this very topic decided my reason for doing so. My reason being is, when it comes to the belief of Catholics like myself, and our belief and defense of the sinlessness of The Blessed Virgin Mary, most non- Catholics Protestants, post Romans 3:23 (Among a couple others) immediately saying "No, Mary was not sinless, for it says right here in Romans 3:23, (KJV version) "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." When pressed on it, the result is pretty much unanimous among Sola Scripturist/Bible only believers. That being, yes...... when this passage says 'all' in Scripture, it absolutely means 'all' have sinned, yes 'all' is an absolute, without question, all means all!

So,,,, I am putting the question out there to my fellow Catholics and our Protestant, Bible only believing brethren ...... Is the word 'All" in Romans 3:23 an absolute, does 'ALL' absolutely mean "ALL"? I say no....... 'all' in Romans is not an absolute.
Looking forward to all (no pun intended he-he) responses.

Have a Blessed Day

Click to expand...

Beyond this scriptural reference, the sinlessness of Mary puts her equal to Jesus Christ of Nazareth who is God Himself. Something to ponder. Be blessed.

If you believe Jesus had no sin, then obviously "all" is not absolute.

Maria Billingsley said:

Beyond this scriptural reference, the sinlessness of Mary puts her equal to Jesus Christ of Nazareth who is God Himself. Something to ponder. Be blessed.

Click to expand...

Was Adam equal to God before he sinned?

Fidelibus said:

Not sure where this has anything to do with my original post. Do you believe the 'all' in Romans 3:23 is an absolute, meaning absolutely all have sinned?

Click to expand...

I believe that Mary The Mother of Christ was blessed among women. I don’t worship Mary.

GDL said:

How is it a figure of speech if all were made sinners by Adam's sin? What God could have done is not in question, is it?

Click to expand...

I'm not sure what your second question means but what I'm getting at is that "all" as describing the general lot of all men doesn't necessarily preclude the possibility of God making exceptions, for his purposes.

GDL said:

Please pick any translation you like. What is relevant is that we're looking at the same word - charitoō - in Luke 1:28 and Ephesians 1:6.

Click to expand...

We are looking at the same root, not the same word. The word differs, and the work kecharitomene is found once in the Bible. Trying to say Ephesians 1:6 is the same as Like 1:28 is disingenuous. They are distinct.

Here are several English translations for 1:28:
CJB, DBY, ERV, ESV, KJV, NAS, NET, NIV, NKJ, YLT

Click to expand...

You realize the translators of all of these are likely of the exact same theological opinion about Mary, and thus they tone down how they translate it?

lsume said:

I believe that Mary The Mother of Christ was blessed among women. I don’t worship Mary.

Click to expand...

I don't worship Mary either. That would be wrong.

Maria Billingsley said:

Beyond this scriptural reference, the sinlessness of Mary puts her equal to Jesus Christ of Nazareth who is God Himself. Something to ponder. Be blessed.

Click to expand...

How, exactly, does Mary being sinless put her equal to God? Were Adam and Eve before they fell also equal to God? They would have to be if being sinless makes one God.

zoidar said:

I think Catholics believe she was taken to heaven in a similar way as Elijah.

Click to expand...

GDL said:

So did Jesus, but at least His sinlessness is made absolutely and abundantly clear, and it's made absolutely clear as to how and why He died.

Click to expand...

It strikes me that this thread is about, "all" as in it doesn't mean all. Now as an explanation I'm hearing it's death doesn't mean death. Generally when people hear explanation after explanation with no corroborating evidence. Then those choice of words and line of reasoning become useless.

chevyontheriver said:

We are looking at the same root, not the same word. The word differs, and the work kecharitomene is found once in the Bible. Trying to say Ephesians 1:6 is the same as Like 1:28 is disingenuous. They are distinct.

Click to expand...

chevyontheriver said:

You realize the translators of all of these are likely of the exact same theological opinion about Mary, and thus they tone down how they translate it?

Click to expand...

I don't think you work in the languages much. Revealing different parsing of the same word is hardly disingenuous and shows you taking us into ad hominem. The fact is that the word you are focused on is simply a participle used as a vocative address: Hail lady who has been/is favored/graced. Nothing is said as to precisely when this favoring took place. To try to build this into sinlessness is pointless.

The other use of the same root simply with different parsing says we were favored/graced. It's the only time that form of the word is used also. Do we take this to mean we were sinless too?

You skipped responding to the Latin adding the words "full of." The words are not in the Greek.

Yes, I've provided several English translations that agree with the Greek. A couple of these are from a Jewish theological viewpoint. One is entitled "literal" and works to provide just that - literal translation. If you'd like me to look at other's please provide them. I don't need them, I work in Greek. Point is, all of them are translating tightly to the Greek, while the Latin is adding words, so, if anyone is making up a theology, it's the Latin translators.

I have no axe to grind here, chevy. I simple got trained in language, because at the end of all this denominational bickering, the Text in original languages is the tightest we have to the Truth and that's what I want to know.

Your unsubstantiated bias on this matter is showing. You're going to have to dig deeper to make this case. My eyes and ears are open if you can provide anything beyond what you've said so far.

Protestants are "sola scriptura" only when it is convenient. If they actually accepted "sola scriptura", they would have to acknowledge that Jesus Christ founded just one Church, 2,000 years ago, and said it was to remain one. They would have to believe that He promised that one Church "The Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth", and "Whatsoever you bind upon Earth is bound in Heaven", and "He who hears you hears Me". That's what the Bible teaches. They would know that that one Church taught the fullness of God's truth for three and a half centuries before the Bible even existed, and that it would still be doing so today even if it never decided to compile some of its early writings into a book. Trying to make a book the source of their beliefs is a totally unbiblical tradition of men, which has resulted in fragmentation into thousands of manmade denominations, each claiming to follow "the Bible alone", yet the teachings/beliefs of each denomination contradicting the teachings/beliefs of the others. Truth cannot contradict truth, so obviously a tremendous amount of untruth is being taught in this unbiblical manmade tradition.

Fidelibus said:

I have been contemplating starting a thread for a while now on this Scripture passage. Conversing with a couple other posters recently on a different thread about this very topic decided my reason for doing so. My reason being is, when it comes to the belief of Catholics like myself, and our belief and defense of the sinlessness of The Blessed Virgin Mary, most non- Catholics Protestants, post Romans 3:23 (Among a couple others) immediately saying "No, Mary was not sinless, for it says right here in Romans 3:23, (KJV version) "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." When pressed on it, the result is pretty much unanimous among Sola Scripturist/Bible only believers. That being, yes...... when this passage says 'all' in Scripture, it absolutely means 'all' have sinned, yes 'all' is an absolute, without question, all means all!

Click to expand...

I think there are two issues here.

i) You said "I've been thinking of starting a thread on this Scripture passage; Romans 3:23 isn't a passage it's a verse, and is actually only part of a sentence. It needs to be read in the context of the passage and what has gone before.
In the first two chapters Paul has been talking about the wrath of God against mankind, God's righteous judgement and the Jews and the law. (I don't know about here, but certainly in OT times, Jews believed they would all be saved on the Day of the Lord simply because they WERE Jews; however they may have behaved, they were still chosen.) Paul then says that both Jews and Gentiles are under sin, Romans 3:9 . In Romans 3:21 he says that now a righteousness apart from the law has been made known - which comes through faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus is the One bringing righteousness; Paul will later say that we are justified through him and reconciled to God through his blood. ALL in verse 23 means all of us; all humans. It clearly cannot include Christ, because Jesus was only able to die for our sins because he was sinless - the spotless Lamb of God, 1 Peter 1:19. He is the One who is bringing the righteousness.

ii) Was Mary sinless?
My answer is 'no', because only a sinless, spotless human being could take our sins upon themselves - had that been Mary, she could have died for us and in fact Jesus would not have needed to come at all. Also, if it is said that Jesus was only sinless because Mary was, where did Mary's sinlessness come from? Her mother?

Fidelibus said:

So,,,, I am putting the question out there to my fellow Catholics and our Protestant, Bible only believing brethren ...... Is the word 'All" in Romans 3:23 an absolute, does 'ALL' absolutely mean "ALL"?

Click to expand...

Yes - because the context makes it clear that Christ cannot be included in that. He was the only perfect person who has ever lived. Even Noah and Job in the OT who were described as righteous, cannot have been perfect, or else they would have shown that it was possible to keep the law perfectly.

chevyontheriver said:

How, exactly, does Mary being sinless put her equal to God? Were Adam and Eve before they fell also equal to God? They would have to be if being sinless makes one God.

Click to expand...

No. Adam and Eve were sinners because they fell into temptation.

PaulCyp1 said:

Protestants are "sola scriptura" only when it is convenient. If they actually accepted "sola scriptura", they would have to acknowledge that Jesus Christ founded just one Church, 2,000 years ago, and said it was to remain one.

Click to expand...

Actually, that one Ekklesia from the Scripture we now have, identifies splits taking place and different problems in different congregations in the first century and a few of the 12 speaking about it and holding the line of what was a very Jewish oriented faith. Also, there are a few points in those Scriptures speaking critically about some things that give me pause every time I read them, because they sound like the very things Roman Catholicism ended up doing.

Strong in Him said:

Yes - because the context makes it clear that Christ cannot be included in that. He was the only perfect person who has ever lived. Even Noah and Job in the OT who were described as righteous, cannot have been perfect, or else they would have shown that it was possible to keep the law perfectly.

Click to expand...

And then we have these pesky translations to deal with:

NKJ Genesis 6:9 This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.

PaulCyp1 said:

Trying to make a book the source of their beliefs is a totally unbiblical tradition of men,

Click to expand...

Kind of like the Jews and the Tanakh? Or the Christian heritage of those same Scriptures as they now stand in Christ?

And there are no "traditions" within Roman Catholicism that we should look at critically based upon what we see in the Text? There is more than one warning in the Text about traditions that don't align with what was being lived and taught in the first century in the true Ekklesia. Thus the Sola Scriptura argument.