Paul was seeking to teach the Galatians that 'adding to salvation by faith alone changes the Gospel of Grace in Christ Jesus. No man except Jesus has lives sinless. We are made 'sinless' in God's eyes because of our faith in Jesus as the One Whom GOD sent for our redemption from the sin nature and it is by our faith in HIM that we no longer have sin accountable to us regarding eternal life in GOD. God and Paul through the Holy Spirit inspiration tells us that we have an advocate, JESUS Christ the Righteous Who is faithful and just to forgive us when we sin.
It is indeed my position and that of Paul that we need not and cannot keep the moral law of God while still an untransformed human. At new birth we are as little children. We are in possession of the spark of righteousness from God's Holy Spirit in us, but we learn the way to go in life by His teaching us. Imagine it as the rightness is urged by the Holy Spirit Presence in our human spirit, which is filtered then through our behavior mechanism (the soul, or mind emotions and will) and thus influences our physical vehicle, the body.
Paul used the well known by the GAlatians to reference what the Judaizers were seeking to bring them under the power of. Paul was not teaching a 'do not do this or that' whether Jewish ritual and sacrament or pagan ritual. He was citing what they were familiar with andusing that as a tool to expose the similarity in Judaizing meant to pull them away from the Grace of God in Christ.
Since you are knowledgable in the moral law of God and the Mosaic law, do you contend that someone is able to never transgress either and thus be justified?
If so, a reading of Romans 5, among other passages, indicates we are indeed saved by faith and only faith in Christ.
It is not a question of earning salvation; that is a pure gift. But we can loose it. Paul was very insistent that those who persist in sin will not inherit the kingdom of God. But, of course, Protestants like to pretend that those words are not there.
We are made 'sinless' in God's eyes because of our faith in Jesus as the One Whom GOD sent for our redemption from the sin nature and it is by our faith in HIM that we no longer have sin accountable to us regarding eternal life in GOD.
We are made sinless in fact. God is not a god of lies. His grace removes sins from the soul; He does not just cover it over. Of course, for most this process will not be completed until after death in Purgatory.
It is indeed my position and that of Paul that we need not and cannot keep the moral law of God while still an untransformed human.
This is NOT what Paul is teaching. Again:
5:16 I say, then: live by the Spirit and you will certainly not gratify the desire of the flesh. 17 For the flesh has desires against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; these are opposed to each other, so that you may not do what you want. 18 But if you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious: immorality, impurity, licentiousness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, rivalry, jealousy, outbursts of fury, acts of selfishness, dissensions, factions, 21 occasions of envy, drinking bouts, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Since you are knowledgable in the moral law of God and the Mosaic law, do you contend that someone is able to never transgress either and thus be justified?
This is not what Catholics teach we must accomplish to gain salvation. How could someone even suggest this given what we teach about confession and Purgatory. We need, with God's grace, to strive to keep the moral law. When we fail, however, we have the free forgiveness of our sins through confession. Whatever remains in us of sin after death his cleansed from our souls by God's grace in Purgatory. But if do not try, if we do not repent of serious sin, then, as Paul clearly states, we will not inherit the kingdom of God.
You are correct sir. The only thing I would say, for the benefit of people in other religions, is that you probably need to accurately, and in great detail, define what true faith is.
The verse that says devils believe, and tremble, does not qualify as true faith. 😁
Correct. One does not become saved or spiritual as a consequence of holding to the moral law, for if that were possible, the gift of God of His Son and His Cross-death would be only an easement, not a necessity.
One cannot be saved by holding uniformly to the moral law, for that is not one's nature as a child of the god of this world.
One acknowledges the moral law, and holds to it not to be saved, but to please Our Savior and His Father because of salvation and justification being complete, for His Nature is the nature of the new man, the one born from above, the godly nature that is putting the old man to death.