The Universality of Sin and the Faithfulness of God

First, we must ask: who or what comes initially? Then, who was entrusted next to perceive? It is through the one whom the Spirit grants the word of the serpent and what follows. But if someone mistakenly believes that God’s oracles are merely God’s writings, let them listen to the speaker of the psalm: the Lord’s oracles are pure words, like silver refined in fire, tested on earth, purified sevenfold. I do not think these pure words are the same as the killing letter. Just as the Jews previously mentioned were first entrusted with God’s oracles, so also some disbelieved; yet this unbelief—whether toward God or his oracles—does not annul God’s faithfulness. What then is God’s faithfulness? Is it God believing in some concerning the oracles? Or is it those entrusted with the oracles believing in God, as Abraham believed in God and it was counted to him as righteousness? I think both views have merit; for we must remember both the one who believes in God and the one entrusted with his oracles, especially in the time when scoffers mock believers, so that God’s faithfulness may not be nullified by the words of unbelievers. Let God be true though every human is a liar, as it is written, so that you may be justified in your words and prevail when judged. Therefore, let it be said not as a wish, but as a declaration: may your name be blessed to the ages. What then? Shall we excel? Not at all; for we have charged both Jews and Greeks with being under sin, as it is written: there is none righteous, not even one; none who understands; none who seeks God; all have turned aside, together become worthless; none who does kindness, not even one; their throat is an open grave; with their tongues they practice deceit; the venom of asps lies under their lips; whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery lie in their ways, and the way of peace they have not known; there is no fear of God before their eyes. He desires to gather explicitly how both Jews and Greeks have come under sin, beginning from what is written: there is none righteous, not even one; none who understands; none who seeks God. We have not found these exact words elsewhere, but we believe they are drawn from the thirteenth and twenty-fifth psalms, altered by the apostle: in the eighteenth psalm, it says the Lord looked down from heaven on the children of men to see if any understand or seek God; and in the twenty-fifth, God looked down from heaven on the children of men to see if any understand or seek God. It seems they equated the act of seeing whether any understand or seek God with the declaration that none understands, none seeks God. I believe the notion of ‘none righteous, not even one’ arises from ‘none does kindness, not even one,’ and thus has been established doubly: once by alteration, once by using identical words while omitting the second mention of ‘there is none.’ The ‘venom of asps under their lips’ appears in the 138th psalm; the ‘mouth full of cursing and bitterness’ seems derived from the ninth psalm: ‘his mouth is full of cursing and bitterness and deceit.’ Next: ‘their feet are swift to shed blood’—this you will find in Isaiah or other editions of Proverbs, in the passage about the hasty to shed blood, which was marked with asterisks in the Septuagint edition. As for ‘destruction and misery in their ways,’ I have not yet located it, but I suspect it is in one of the prophets; likewise, ‘the way of peace they have not known’ I place in the prophets, and in the psalms, ‘there is no fear of God before their eyes.’ Given the multiplicity of sins, not each person is guilty of all, but some by one sin, others by another, and thus all by all. We know that whatever the law says to those under it speaks, so that every mouth may be silenced and all the world held accountable to God; for no flesh will be justified before Him by works of law, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. What is common to all flesh in the works of Moses’ law? And how does knowledge of sin come through Moses’ law, even among many who knew their own sins before Moses? Cain says the cause of me is greater to be released; but those who went down to Egypt toward Joseph the patriarchs speak concerning the things of Joseph, toward…