Why doesn't the Bible say that Mary was sinless?

[justasking4]

Where does it say this in scripture?

You Protestants have a consistent problem in your “solas”. You want By faith ALONE/Only and by Scripture ALONE/Only and by Grace ALONE/Only in ad-nasuem contradiction. Do you not believe your own (erroneous) Protestant theology that is based on the literal interpretation that ‘Jesus becomes sin’ on the cross?

If you are going to use absolute terms like ALONE and ONLY then you start to sound like you are pontificating. If you do that you need a better batting average because you constantly contradict yourself and prove yourself to be fallible.

James

i understood the question to ask who was sinless in the Bible. The only one would be the Lord Jesus.

 

[emeraldisle]

Another point to ponder: Didn’t God create Adam and Eve without sin? They spent quite a bit of time in the presence of God, we don’t know how long they were in the Garden before the Fall, but we know that they were sinless at their creation. If God could do that for Adam and Eve, why couldn’t He do that for the Ark of the New Covenant, Mary?

This is a good point and it shows us why Gods written Word is so very important because God tells us the truth so we don’t get into dangerous speculation.

When we search God written Word we find out that Mary wasn’t sinless but when we go outside of Gods written Word we get into all sorts of dangerous speculation about Mary.

.

 

[kaycee]

And wasn’t it ‘the many’ (the majority) of people of Berea who believed Paul initially? It wasn’t that big a place. So where did these Berean crowds come from if not among Paul’s own former followers, hmmm?

And no, the Bereans didn’t escort Paul anywhere - they ‘sent him away’ from Berea, sure, but there’s no indication that they cared where he ended up or helped him to get to safety.

Who’s not rightly dividing now? :tsktsk:

You are way off base. The BRETHREN sent them off and Silas and Timonthy stayed. Stayed with who? The angry mob?

The BRETHREN escorted PAUL to Athens.

Acts 17:15 15Now those who escorted Paul brought him as far as Athens; and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left.

The Brethren who escorted Paul to Athens were told by Paul to send Silas and Timonthy, who were staying with BRETHREN to come to him ASAP.

The Bereans were noble because they searched the scriptures, as well as caring for Paul’s safety. :tsktsk:

 

[justasking4]

Do you have any names? I’m justasking…

:tsktsk:

 

[Pixie_Dust]

This is a good point and it shows us why Gods written Word is so very important because God tells us the truth so we don’t get into dangerous speculation.

When we search God written Word we find out that Mary wasn’t sinless but when we go outside of Gods written Word we get into all sorts of dangerous speculation about Mary.

.

So, where does God’s written Word say that Mary wasn’t sinless? My Bible says she was “full of grace” and if one is FULL of grace there is no place for sin.

 

[adstrinity]

Nobody has answered my latest question.

 

[LilyM]

The Holy Spirit inspired the writers to WRITE about the teachings of the Savior. That is not oral tradition.

So, you would NOT agree with Cardinal Newman who had to concede there was zero historical evidence that Paul taught anything like the Marian doctrines and papal infalibility.

Newmans unique development of doctrine theory exists to spin away the fact that there are NO writings containing any mention of those “oral” traditions until 200 to 800 years after the resurrection.

How do you know that Paul taught those doctrines?

Of course it’s oral tradition - JESUS didn’t write his teachings down, nor at any stage ask for them to be written down, but taught them orally. That they became written later is a gift of the Holy Spirit, but doesn’t change that it was oral Tradition - the Talmud is still called ‘oral tradition’ by the Jews even though it was written down at a point well after it began to be taught.

No evidence that Paul did teach these things, no - but was he the only Apostle? Seems you’ve forgotten there were 11 others. So it matters not a bit if there’s no evidence that he in particular taught it. And just as you can tell someone has had their ear cut off by seeing the severed ear rather than seeing the person themselves, so we can deduce that if these teachings were passed on and generally believed, they came from the Apostles, who were promised to teach all truth and that that truth would be preserved by the Holy Spirit.

The early Church mostly believed it, on the available evidence, and they did so because were passed given all their teachings from the Apostles collectively - and largely in oral form. No less true for being oral, no less true if none of it was ever written down at all, let alone written down much later.

Some of these oral teachings were, as you say, written 200 to 800 years later, just as the events of Genesis were written down at least 800 years after they happened.

Again, why you think the written word is the be-all and end-all is beyond me, seeing as how the early Church did quite well in conveying its teaching without (by and large) the written word.

 

[emeraldisle]

Consider this:
If all have sinned in the literal sense through your sin of fundamentalist logic, that means Jesus sinned too. But Jesus did not sin - even though Protestants like to make out that Jesus became sin in a false substitution sort of theology. That sort of Protestant error puts the Trinity at odds with itself and becomes blatantly impossible. So your interpretation is in error.

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Rom 3:23

Remember Jesus is God.

For even hereunto were you called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: 1Peter 2:21-22

So the written Word of God clearly shows us that Jesus isn’t included in the “all” but all the rest of humanity is and that includes Mary.

Just to make one final point about how you **fundamentalists **set yourself up for error please note that the phrase “so death passed upon all men” or ‘all men have sinned’ please note the obvious that Mary was not a man. Why be inconsistent and not take a literal read here?

Wo"men"

BTW a fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith. Do you believe in the fundamentals of your faith?

.

 

[kaycee]

So, where does God’s written Word say that Mary wasn’t sinless? My Bible says she was “full of grace” and if one is FULL of grace there is no place for sin.

A better transaltion is NASB

28And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.”
29But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was.
30The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God.

Favored one, cannot be made to convey a concept of grace as a quantity that would only appear Many hundreds of years later.

 

[LilyM]

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Rom 3:23

Remember Jesus is God.

For even hereunto were you called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: 1Peter 2:21-22

So the written Word of God clearly shows us that Jesus isn’t included in the “all” but all the rest of humanity is and that includes Mary.

Wo"men"

BTW a fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith. Do you believe in the fundamentals of your faith?

.

The Bible no more shows us that all humanity is included in this statement, than it shows us that literally every person in Jerusalem or any other place went to see John or hear Jesus speak, even though on occasions it says ‘all the people’ went to listen to one or other.

 

[adstrinity]

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Rom 3:23

Remember Jesus is God.

For even hereunto were you called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: 1Peter 2:21-22

So the written Word of God clearly shows us that Jesus isn’t included in the “all” but all the rest of humanity is and that includes Mary.

Wo"men"

BTW a fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith. Do you believe in the fundamentals of your faith?

.

I still don’t see where that says Mary had sinned or would sin. Please leave all but Mary out of this as that is to whom this topic is dedicated.

 

[Pixie_Dust]

A better transaltion is NASB

28And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.”
29But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was.
30The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God.

Favored one, cannot be made to convey a concept of grace as a quantity that would only appear Many hundreds of years later.

The BEST “translation” is the original Greek word, kecharitomene.

" 'Highly favoured' (kecharitomene). Perfect passive participle of charitoo and means endowed with grace (charis), enriched with grace as in Ephesians. 1:6, . . . The Vulgate gratiae plena [full of grace] "is right, if it means 'full of grace which thou hast received'; wrong, if it means 'full of grace which thou hast to bestow' " (A.T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, p. 14)

"It is permissible, on Greek grammatical and linguistic grounds, to paraphrase *kecharitomene* as completely, perfectly, enduringly endowed with grace." (Blass and DeBrunner, Greek Grammar of the New Testament).

However, Luke 1:28 uses a special conjugated form of “charitoo.” It uses “kecharitomene,” while Ephesians 1:6 uses “echaritosen,” which is a different form of the verb “charitoo.” Echaritosen means “he graced” (bestowed grace). Echaritosen signifies a momentary action, an action brought to pass. (Blass and DeBrunner, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, p.166).

Whereas, Kecharitomene, the perfect passive participle, shows a completeness with a permanent result. Kecharitomene denotes continuance of a completed action (H. W. Smyth, Greek Grammar [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968], p. 108-109, sec 1852:b; also Blass and DeBrunner, p.175).
see members.aol.com/johnprh/conception.html

 

[emeraldisle]

The Bible no more shows us that all humanity is included in this statement, than it shows us that literally every person in Jerusalem or any other place went to see John or hear Jesus speak, even though on occasions it says ‘all the people’ went to listen to one or other.

19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. 20 Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. 21 But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, 22 even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
Rom 3:19-23

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[kaycee]

Of course it’s oral tradition - JESUS didn’t write his teachings down, nor at any stage ask for them to be written down, but taught them orally. That they became written later is a gift of the Holy Spirit, but doesn’t change that it was oral Tradition - the Talmud is still called ‘oral tradition’ by the Jews even though it was written down at a point well after it began to be taught./quote]Not sure how making everything tradition helps your case.

[quot]No evidence that Paul did teach these things, no - but was he the only Apostle? Seems you’ve forgotten there were 11 others.

Sorry, let me clarify, There is Zero evidence that ANYONE for the first 200 years after the resurrection mentioned any RC Marian or papal doctrines.

So it matters not a bit if there’s no evidence that he in particular taught it. And just as you can tell someone has had their ear cut off by seeing the severed ear rather than seeing the person themselves, so we can deduce that if these teachings were passed on and generally believed.

We can more likely deduce that since there was silence for many hundreds of years concering these RC doctrines that the Apostles knew nothing about them.

The early Church mostly believed it, on the available evidence, and they did so because were passed given all their teachings from the Apostles collectively - and largely in oral form. No less true for being oral, no less true if none of it was ever written down at all, let alone written down much later.

Repeated assertions might convince some in the choir.

Some of these oral teachings were, as you say, written 200 to 800 years later, just as the events of Genesis were written down at least 800 years after they happened.

Offcourse Genesis IS scripture.

Again, why you think the written word is the be-all and end-all is beyond me, seeing as how the early Church did quite well in conveying its teaching without (by and large) the written word.

It seems GOD puts a high premium on the written WORD. Can you recall any scripture where GOD lifts oral tradition to the same heights?

 

[emeraldisle]

I still don’t see where that says Mary had sinned or would sin. Please leave all but Mary out of this as that is to whom this topic is dedicated.

Once you see that Mary is human you will then see that she is included in the following;

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
Rom 3:23

.

 

[guanophore]

Are there ANY big T traditions you can think of that Paul did not write about?

EVERYTHING that Paul wrote came from the Traditions. All the Teaching was oral before it was written.

My mistake. Without anything written i think within a generation or 2 it would be gone.

This is your mistake, ja4. If this were true, we wouldn’t have a bible.

Admit it, you don’t know what they are.

I admit that it is not possible for you to know what they are. And, I admit that talking about this subject with you is like throwing pearls where they should not be thrown.

I have to congratulate you, though, I successfully derailing the thread. The whole lot followed you right into the black hole you created! :dancing:

So the idea of an oral tradition of the apostle is futile since we don’t know what it was exactly. All we know what Jesus and His apostles is to be found in the written Scriptrues.

It is futile for you, ja4, because you deny that they exist. What is really puzzling is your preoccupation on this subject. It is very similar to what is known as perseveration, one of the symptoms of mental illness. Since we are not allowed to give any medical or psychiatric help on the forum, you will not be able to get what you need here. There are medications that can help with that, so I think, instead of trying to nail this jellow to the wall, you make yourself an appointment with a professional.

I will continue to pray for you, regardless, and will ask the Immaculate Mary, our Mother, to do the same.

I suppose He could have. The question though is: Did He and what is the evidence for it? If He did He never revealed to anyone.

It is quite clear that you have not yet received this revelation. A news flash, ja4. It is hard to receive revelation from God if you are not open to it. However, it is my fervent prayer that this will be revealed to you, along with the error of Sola Scriptura.

The Holy Spirit inspired the writers to WRITE about the teachings of the Savior. That is not oral tradition.

Catholics, not being limited to Sola Scriptura, are not concerned about which parts are written and which parts are not.

Matt 28:18-20
18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”

The Apostolic Teaching consists of all that Jesus taught the Apostles to observe. Some of this was committed to the NT, some was not.

So, you would NOT agree with Cardinal Newman who had to concede there was zero historical evidence that Paul taught anything like the Marian doctrines and papal infalibility.

I would not agree.

Newmans unique development of doctrine theory exists to spin away the fact that there are NO writings containing any mention of those “oral” traditions until 200 to 800 years after the resurrection.

This is not a concern for Catholics either, since the canon of the NT was not closed until the 4th century.

How do you know that Paul taught those doctrines?

 

[guanophore]

Do you have any names? I’m justasking…

Actually, there are a variety of writing styles demonstrated under one particular monniker, which may point to the possiblity that there are several people logging in and furthering that agenda. If I may note, it has been pretty successful derailing this thread!

Who was this “whom” and when? Secondly there were many church fathers did not teach she was sinless.

That’s part of Sacred Tradition,and therefore, off limits for you my friend!

My impression of the refromation was not focused on these doctrines but other things. Also Luther was still influenced by his catholicism.

Seems like you have some reformation history to read as well!
If Luther was so influenced by the false teachings of Catholicism, how can you trust any of the things he taught?

Those (NT writers) that knew her personally never taught she was sinless either. They never make the case for it.

I am sure they never imagined that the mother of their Lord would ever come under such slander and calumny. They adopted her as their mother, and honored her just as Jesus did. Even more so after His death, I am sure.

I agree. It was done more on a popular vote than on a biblical-historical basis.

Divine revelation can hardly be construed as “popular vote”, but it is true that the Sensus Fidelum does play a role in the development of doctrine. It is significant that a doctrine has “always been held by the faithful”.

This is a good point and it shows us why Gods written Word is so very important because God tells us the truth so we don’t get into dangerous speculation.

When we search God written Word we find out that Mary wasn’t sinless but when we go outside of Gods written Word we get into all sorts of dangerous speculation about Mary.

.

this is very interesting to me. I am mystified why the belief that Mary is sinless is “dangerous”. I mean, how does that jeapardize someone’s salvation? It’s not like Catholics are going around saying this about themselves…

 

[LilyM]

Sorry, let me clarify, There is Zero evidence that ANYONE for the first 200 years after the resurrection mentioned any RC Marian or papal doctrines.

So what, someone woke up one day in 200 AD and out of thin air said ‘I’m gonna write today about how we need to believe the Pope is infallible! Not that anyone ever discussed the concept before, not that anyone ever thought or taught such a thing before, but I’m gonna wing it, make it up on the spot and furthermore pretend it’s something that we’ve believed all along’??? The ECFs didn’t quite work that way. :nope:

We can more likely deduce that since there was silence for many hundreds of years concering these RC doctrines that the Apostles knew nothing about them.

No-one wrote about what the Apostles ate or whether they ever slept or washed themselves either, but we can assume they did eat and do the rest, we can make educated guesses as to the sorts of things they ate even. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence!

Offcourse Genesis IS scripture.

What were the happenings of Genesis before they were written down, though? (hint, ‘scripture’ literally means ‘writings’ in Latin, so if it ain’t written it ain’t scripture, and if it wasn’t written before Moses then it wasn’t scripture before he wrote it).

And more importantly, were they even an iota less true or less worthy of (and necessary of) belief prior to Moses because they weren’t written down before his time? Would they have been unworthy of or unnecessary of belief if they had never been written down? You’re giving the writing of the event or teaching priority over the actual teaching itself.

It seems GOD puts a high premium on the written WORD. Can you recall any scripture where GOD lifts oral tradition to the same heights?

Yup - several. Most notably, Jesus said to his Apostles to ‘teach them to observe all that I have commanded you’ - which at that stage was unwritten and not scripture. He doesn’t say ‘teach them to observe what SCRIPURE commands’.

And Paul certainly puts oral traditions on precisely the same level as the written word when he commands his followers to observe all the traditions whether oral or written.

 

[kaycee]

The BEST “translation” is the original Greek word, kecharitomene.

" 'Highly favoured' (kecharitomene). Perfect passive participle of charitoo and means endowed with grace (charis), enriched with grace as in Ephesians. 1:6, . . . The Vulgate gratiae plena [full of grace] "is right, if it means 'full of grace which thou hast received'; wrong, if it means 'full of grace which thou hast to bestow' " (A.T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, p. 14)

"It is permissible, on Greek grammatical and linguistic grounds, to paraphrase *kecharitomene* as completely, perfectly, enduringly endowed with grace." (Blass and DeBrunner, Greek Grammar of the New Testament).

However, Luke 1:28 uses a special conjugated form of “charitoo.” It uses “kecharitomene,” while Ephesians 1:6 uses “echaritosen,” which is a different form of the verb “charitoo.” Echaritosen means “he graced” (bestowed grace). Echaritosen signifies a momentary action, an action brought to pass. (Blass and DeBrunner, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, p.166).

Whereas, Kecharitomene, the perfect passive participle, shows a completeness with a permanent result. Kecharitomene denotes continuance of a completed action (H. W. Smyth, Greek Grammar [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968], p. 108-109, sec 1852:b; also Blass and DeBrunner, p.175).
see members.aol.com/johnprh/conception.html

“Modern scholarship has dismissed the translation ‘full of grace’ as a nonviable rendition” of the Greek term used. Svendsen notes even Catholic sources are avoiding this translation:

"Even a Catholic source such as Zerwick avoids the translation ‘full of grace,’ opting instead for the less theologically loaded praises ‘endowed with grace; dearly loved.’ The MNT task force translates it as ‘graciously favored by God,’ while noting that the Douay Rheims translation, **‘full of grace,’ is not literal and is gradually being replaced among Roman Catholic translators. **The most recent standard Catholic translations the NAB and the JB, have followed suit in their renditions (NAB, ‘O highly favored daughter’; JB, ‘So highly favored’) [Eric Svendsen, Who Is My Mother? (New York: Calvary Press, 2001) p. 129].

aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=2490

 

[adstrinity]

Once you see that Mary is human you will then see that she is included in the following;

*for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, *
Rom 3:23

.

Show me that Mary is human.