{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/105/1050262.htm","path":"chr/ecf/105/1050262.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/105/1050262.htm","text":"Chapter 15 [XIV.]\u2014Not Everything [of Doctrinal Truth] is Written in Scripture in So Many Words.\nThat, too, which is said to him, \u201cthat it is nowhere written in so many words, A man can be without sin,\u201d he easily refutes thus: \u201cThat the question here is not in what precise words each doctrinal statement is made.\u201d It is perhaps not without reason that, while in several passages of Scripture we may find it said that men are without excuse, it is nowhere found that any man is described as being without sin, except Him only, of whom it is plainly said, that \u201cHe knew no sin.\u201d 1156 Similarly, we read in the passage where the subject is concerning priests: \u201cHe was in all points tempted like as we are, only without sin,\u201d 1157 \u2014meaning, of course, in that flesh which bore the likeness of sinful flesh, although it was not sinful flesh; a likeness, indeed, which it would not have borne if it had not been in every other respect the same as sinful flesh. How, however, we are to understand this: \u201cWhosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; neither can he sin, for his seed remaineth in him;\u201d 1158 while the Apostle John himself, as if he had not been born of God, or else were addressing men who had not been born of God, lays down this position: \u201cIf we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,\u201d 1159 \u2014I have already explained, with such care as I was able, in those books which I wrote to Marcellinus on this very subject. 1160 It seems, p. 126 moreover, to me to be an interpretation worthy of acceptance to regard the clause of the above quoted passage: \u201cNeither can he sin,\u201d as if it meant: He ought not to commit sin. For who could be so foolish as to say that sin ought to be committed, when, in fact, sin is sin, for no other reason than that it ought not to be committed?\nSee the De Peccat. Meritis et Remissione, ii. 8\u201310.","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. V: A Treatise on Nat...","type":"page"}