Chapter 7.—What is the Meaning of “In Whom All Have Sinned”?

But these speak thus who wish to wrest men from the apostle’s words into their own thought. For where the apostle says, “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so passed upon all men,”259    Rom. v. 12. they will have it there understood not that “sin” passed over, but “death.” What, then, is the meaning of what follows, “Whereto all have sinned”? For either the apostle says that in that “one man” all have sinned of whom he had said, “By one man sin entered into the world,” or else in that “sin,” or certainly in “death.” For it need not disturb us that he said not “in which” [using the feminine form of the pronoun], but “in whom” [using the masculine] all have sinned; since “death” in the Greek language is of the masculine gender. Let them, then, choose which they will,—for either in that “man” all have sinned, and it is so said because when he sinned all were in him; or in that “sin” all have sinned, because that was the doing of all in general which all those who were born would have to derive; or it remains for them to say that in that “death” all sinned. But in what way this can be understood, I do not clearly see. For all die in the sin; they do not sin in the death; for when sin precedes, death follows—not when death precedes, sin follows. Because sin is the sting of death—that is, the sting by whose stroke death occurs, not the sting with which death strikes.260    [This is a distinction as to the kind of genitive involved in the phrase “sting of death.” Augustin says “of death” is genitive of the object, not of the author or subject.—W.] Just as poison, if it is drunk, is called the cup of death, because by that cup death is caused, not because the cup is caused by the death, or is given by death. But if “sin” cannot be understood by those words of the apostle as being that “wherein all have sinned,” because in Greek, from which the Epistle is translated, “sin” is expressed in the feminine gender, it remains that all men are understood to have sinned in that first “man,” because all men were in him when he sinned; and from him sin is derived by birth, and is not remitted save by being born again. For thus also the sainted Hilary understood what is written, “wherein all have sinned;” for he says, “wherein,” that is, in Adam, “all have sinned.”261    Commentaries by Hilary the Deacon, printed among the Works of Ambrose, vol. iv. (Patrol. Lat. xvii.) Then he adds, “It is manifest that all have sinned in Adam, as it were in the mass; for he himself was corrupted by sin, and all whom he begot were born under sin.” When he wrote this, Hilary, without any ambiguity, indicated how we should understand the words, “wherein all have sinned.”

7. Sed hoc ideo dicunt isti, dum volunt ex verbis Apostoli in suum sensum homines detorquere. Ubi enim ait Apostolus, Per unum hominem peccatum intravit in mundum, et per peccatum mors; et ita in omnes homines pertransiit; ibi volunt intelligi non peccatum pertransisse, sed mortem. Quid est ergo quod sequitur, in quo omnes peccaverunt? Aut enim in illo uno homine peccasse dicit omnes Apostolus, de quo dixerat, Per unum hominem peccatum intravit in mundum: aut in illo peccato, aut certe in morte. Non enim movere debet, quia non dixit, In qua, sed, in quo omnes peccaverunt: mors quippe in graeca lingua generis masculini est . Quodlibet ergo eligant: aut enim in illo homine peccaverunt omnes, et ideo dictum est, quoniam quando ille peccavit, in illo erant omnes: aut in illo peccato peccaverunt omnes, quia generaliter omnium factum est, quod nascentes tracturi erant omnes: aut restat ut dicant, quod in illa morte peccaverint omnes. Sed hoc quemadmodum possit intelligi, non plane video. In peccato enim moriuntur omnes , non in morte peccant: nam peccato praecedente, mors sequitur; non morte praecedente, peccatum. Aculeus quippe mortis est peccatum (I Cor. XV, 56), id est, aculeus cujus punctione fit mors, non aculeus quo pungit mors. Sicut venenum si bibitur, appellatur poculum mortis, quod eo poculo facta sit mors; non quod morte sit poculum factum, aut a morte sit datum. Quod si propterea non potest illis verbis Apostoli peccatum intelligi, in quo omnes peccaverunt, quia in graeco, unde translata est Epistola, peccatum feminino genere positum est : restat ut in illo primo homine peccasse omnes intelligantur; quia in illo fuerunt omnes quando ille peccavit, unde peccatum nascendo trahitur, quod nisi renascendo non solvitur. Nam et sic sanctus Hilarius intellexit quod scriptum est, in quo omnes peccaverunt: ait enim, «In quo, id est in Adam, omnes peccaverunt.» Deinde addidit: «Manifestum in Adam omnes peccasse quasi in massa. Ipse enim per peccatum corruptus, omnes quos genuit, nati sunt sub peccato» . Haec scribens Hilarius sine ambiguitate commonuit, quomodo intelligendum esset, in quo omnes peccaverunt.