{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-4182","native_reference":{"book_number":250,"chapter_from":7,"chapter_to":7,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":20,"verse_to":20},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Augustine of Hippo</b>: The following is one of the many arguments that Pelagius uses in treating this subject: \"Once more I repeat: I say that it is possible for a person to be without sin. And what do you say? That it is impossible for a person to be without sin? But I do not say,\" he adds, \"that there is a person without sin, nor do you say that there is not a person without sin. We are disputing about what is possible and impossible, not about what is and is not.\" Next he notes that a number of the passages of Scripture which are usually invoked against them do not bear upon the question in dispute, namely, whether or not a person can be without sin: \"For there is no one who is free from pollution,\" and, \"There is no one that does not sin,\" and, \"There is no just person on the earth,\" and, \"There is no one that does good.\" \"These and other similar texts,\" he says, \"apply to nonexistence, not to impossibility. By examples of this kind it is shown how some persons were at a given time, not that they could not have been something else. For this reason they are justly found to be guilty. For if they were as they were because they could not have been otherwise, then they are free from blame.\"<br/><i>— ON NATURE AND GRACE 8</i></p><p><b>Bede</b>: There are less serious sins about which it has been written that \"there is not a righteous person on earth who does what is good and does not sin,\" and, \"No living person will be made righteous in your sight.\"<br/><i>— Commentary on the Catholic Epistles, 2 Peter 1:10</i></p><p><b>Bede</b>: The Lord himself gives us sure confidence of obtaining what we properly ask when he adds, \"Therefore if you, although you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from heaven give his good Spirit to those who ask him?\" His disciples were good, as far as human judgment can see. He calls them \"evil\" because there is surely no one in this life who is capable of being free from moral faults, as Solomon states when he says, \"There is not a just person on earth, who does good and does not sin.\"<br/><i>— Homilies on the Gospels 2:14</i></p><p><b>Gregory the Dialogist</b>: Because the prophet says, \"Behold, I was conceived in iniquity, and in sin did my mother bring me forth,\" no one coming into the world with sin can be sinless. That is why the same prophet says, \"No one living shall be considered righteous in your sight,\" and Solomon, \"There is no righteous man on earth, who does good, and does not sin.\"<br/><i>— Forty Gospel Homilies, Homily 39</i></p><p><b>Jerome</b>: \"Wisdom<br/>strengthens the wise more than ten mighty men which are in the city. For there is not a just man on the earth,<br/>that does good and does not sin. \"Therefore wisdom strengthens the righteous,<br/>and not even the aid of all the citizens of the city can help him, for although<br/>someone may be righteous, yet while he is alive he is subject to vices and<br/>sins, and he therefore needs greater protection. Another reading of this is: the ten who hold<br/>power and are in the city are angels, who have arrived at the complete number<br/>of 'denarii' and are here to help mankind. <br/>But if anyone should consider different types of help, the aid of wisdom<br/>is better, because that is the aid of our Lord Jesus Christ. For after the angels said, \"we would<br/>have protected Babylon yet it is not now protected, so let us leave it, and let<br/>each one of us go out unto his own land\" [Ier. 51, 9.]. Then the teacher of doctors himself came down<br/>and healed us with a touch of His finger, we who were spattered with blood, and<br/>wet with the blood of sinners, we who weigh out all our possessions against<br/>healing. But He healed in that city<br/>which is in that world, and 'strengthened in wisdom' or as the Septuagint says<br/>'helped'. For it is given and added to<br/>everyone who possesses it. But the man<br/>who sins greatly is stuck in deep and needs more help: therefore Wisdom herself<br/>came to his aid. Another meaning of this<br/>verse is: above he had said that one should be kind to both the good and the<br/>wicked: therefore someone was able to reply: though I want to be kind to all<br/>men, I have not the power with which to do this. And a righteous man does not have such<br/>riches, which normally come more abundantly to sinners. Therefore he now says, those whom you can't<br/>help with money, help with advice and comfort them with solace. For one is more able to excel in these ways<br/>than any of the greatest of potentates. <br/>And you would be wise to do this, for the scale of justice is great, and<br/>must decide for whom, how much, how long, and of what sort, help is given,<br/>either with monetary support or with advice.<br/><i>— Commentary on Ecclesiastes</i></p><p><b>Origen of Alexandria</b>: And it is likely also that in countless other things demons delude us and influence us to act according to their will. And it is possible that, just as no one among us is \"clean from defilement,\" and there is no \"just person on the earth who will do good and will not sin,\" so also there is no one who has always been free of demons and has never fallen victim to their influence.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON THE GOSPEL OF John 20:328</i></p><p><b>Origen of Alexandria</b>: If you wish to recall some other of the saints, the word of Scripture replies to you, saying, \"There is no one upon the earth who does good and sins not.\" Therefore only Jesus rightly \"has perfect hands\"; who alone \"does not sin,\" that is, who has perfect and whole works of his hands.<br/><i>— HOMILIES ON Leviticus 12:3.2</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"f1b29a0b622be72b4bc84c82aed14e5c0b6f6168cc6cca61dc66355049dafee0","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":4182,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"57d08d51637b17325df1870aa41cd60031ef4cf4bcda8b08865e9e286e070234","translator":null,"work":null}