Correct. ALL those texts which you offered and which I quoted do not carry the meaning of blunders overlooked. They all carry the meaning of deliverance from sin as I affirmed, as well as Colossians 1:14 to which your referred. That is also the case with MOST New Testament employment of the word “αφεσις” (this is the lexical form, not “αφεσιν”). However, Ephesians 1:7 and the other quotes to which I referred earlier DO carry the meaning of overlooking blunders. What meaning do you attach to them? Do you think that blunders are sins from which people must be delivered? If not overlooked, in what sense are blunders forgiven?

…and thus deliverance = forgiveness, period!

Quibbling Don… <αφεσιν> afesin is the Greek rendering in both texts for Eph 1:7 & Col 1:14. And in BOTH texts REDEMPTION is what is secured OVER BOTH “trespasses” and “sins” thus demonstrating said forgiveness covers all, as in BOTH, and thus has NO WEAK OR SOFT OPTION you are advocating.

Your translated “overlooking blunders” from the texts = forgive transgressions. Your blunder is you are overlooking this — see above.

In what sense forgiven… in TOTALITY; and if not in totality then said forgiveness is conditional i.e., NOT TRUE FORGIVENESS!

Don… you have made a mountain out of a molehill, and in all honesty, I suspect simply to jack-up certain other doctrinal presuppositions.

I am not quibbling. I have no desire to quibble. Of course, the noun appears as “αφεσιν” in these two texts since it is an accusative singular in both instances. I just thought some information would be helpful to you—that a Greek noun is usually quoted in its lexical form (the nominative singular). Apparently I was mistaken in that thought.

Well ok… thanks for the information Don.

Oh, so you now agree that “forgiveness” is tantamount to “deliverance”? If so, we are getting closer to a common understanding.

I am not sure to what your refer as “the above”. Anyway, you seem to think “overlooking blunders” and “forgiving transgressions” are two different activities. I say they are not. First let’s examine the Greek nouns usually translated as “transgression.” There are two distinct nouns, and they do NOT have the same meaning.

One of the nouns is “παραβασις” (parabasis). This word literally means “an overstepping” of some boundary. It means “the intentional transgression or violation of a command.” A person who does this needs to repent, and change his ways. Then the offense may be forgiven, and the relationship be restored with those whom he has offended. If his offense is against another person, he can demonstrate to that person that he has truly had a change of heart and mind about his actions by ceasing to offend. If his offense is against God, he can receive enabling grace from God to be delivered from his wrongdoing. (Titus 2:11-15). God doesn’t overlook these trespasses, but delivers offenders from them when they repent (have a change of heart and mind).

The second noun is “παραπτωμα” (paraptōma). This word literally means “a side slip” or “a fall beside someone or something.” It is unintentional; that’s why I translated the word as “blunder.” If a landowner in a countryside has “no trespassing” signs around his property, there is a great difference between someone who blunders onto his property at a place where the signs are not obvious, and someone who sees the signs, but ignores them in order to hunt deer on the man’s property. In the first case, the landowner may “forgive” the man in the weak sense of “forgive.” If the blunderer explains that he didn’t see the signs and was unsure of the boundary, the landowner may overlook the blunder, and merely say to him, “Be more careful next time” instead of taking him to court for trespassing. However, the same landowner would not overlook the deliberate trespasser. He might well file trespassing charges.

In each of the verses Eph 2:11, Matt 6:14,15, and Mark 11:25, the word is the accusative plural of “παραπτωμα” which I appropriately translated as “blunders.” A person can repent and be delivered from intentional wrongdoing. But how can a person repent of blunders? Can he say, “I am sorry for this blunder; I will never commit a blunder again!” God delivers people from intentional wrongdoing—not from unintentional blunders.

“In totality” is not a sense of forgiveness; it is but the conjunction of two words that are meaningless—unless you explain what you mean by them.
And yes, true forgiveness is in totality, in consequence of repentance. What is there about true forgiveness in response to repentance and deliverance, and leading to restoration of relationship that makes it “not true” in your mind? I can think of no concept of forgiveness that could be any “truer”.

if the object of our discussion has been a mere molehill, then why have you so adamantly opposed such a molehill? Or is it the mountain that you have been opposing?

In your mind, what might those “doctrinal presuppositions” be?

Don… “IMO” you are deliberately obfuscating. You cannot possible think I’m waxing lyrical in two opposite directions at the same time… but these two quotes of yours suggest just that. I should imagine it would also be clear to anyone reading along that you are either NOT reading my posts properly, or you are just playing fast and fancy to muddy the waters. Examples:

You say… “Oh, so you now agree that “forgiveness” is tantamount to “deliverance”?” Let me quote myself from previous posts — hence my last see above that somehow conveniently has you flummoxed…

I think you might be equivocating… IF my debt has been delivered or released it has been forgiven and NOT “necessarily” BUT definitely, period! Even so, using your “not necessarily” angle Paul STILL reads and MEANS the same, i.e., “*In Him we have redemption through His blood, the deliverance or release of sins, according to the riches of His grace *” etc. Same house different street.

Israel was captive to SIN and thereby crushed by SIN and so needed deliverance FROM SIN… and THAT came via the forgiveness of sin i.e., redemption (Eph 1:7; Col 1:14) — Jesus and Paul were on the same page.

I am maintaining ‘deliverance/release’ equates to the self-same thing AS ‘forgiveness’ AS ALL the translations of those texts given ALREADY have it. There is NO quibble amongst these translations with regards to a supposed weaker/stronger stance, that you for your own reasons have manufactured.
Don… I have NOT just NOW come to “agree that “forgiveness” is tantamount to “deliverance”?” — it has been my stated position all along. You however in your zeal to prove some point have missed the wood for the trees… hence your own blunder.

It is ONLY YOU Don who is making this all meaningless by your butchering of the text… BOTH English AND Greek!

I gave you two NT examples (Eph 1:7 & Col 1:14) where redemption equates to the unilateral FORGIVENESS of God via Christ that encompasses and encapsulates BOTH “transgressions and sins” — something you keep framing as either “intentional” or “unintentional” — that claim in itself is over the top, BUT regardless… let me repeat:

Redemption equates to the unilateral FORGIVENESS of God — nothing in these texts mentions nor requires repentance for forgiveness to be effective and TRUE. God’s forgiveness is NOT dependant on man’s repentance. THAT doesn’t negate repentance, BUT where repentance IS mentioned, and I’ve previously given those texts too, there are context driven factors in play; you however have made repentance a carte blanch condition for forgiveness to be TRUE… as I have shown, that is overreach.

Well, Davo, you still haven’t stated what you mean by “forgiveness without repentance” so there’s no way for me to show that it is not the case, for “forgiveness” is just a word you are using. If it has a meaning you should be able to provide that meaning.

However if “forgiveness”=“deliverance” has been your position all along, then you HAVE provided a meaning (with which I agree).
But if that is the meaning that you have recognized all along, problems arise for which you have not yet expressed solutions.

1. From what is an unrepentant man delivered?

2. If forgiveness of a blunder is deliverance, from what has the blunderer been delivered?

You keep posting—you keep attacking me (you seem very gifted in that regard), but you give no explanations that I can understand.

From such as whatever hitherto beforehand had been held to his charge… from such he has been released, delivered and redeemed, i.e., FORGIVEN! I’d be fairly confident others reading along can see and understand this basic truth WITHOUT having to make up uncle-Tom type scenarios in a vain attempt at explaining this away.

Again Don, you can equivocate all you like, but in my initial foray into this convoluted conversation (3rd paragraph down) I answered this… you simply didn’t like the answer given and have created all manner of suspect deviations and boundaries yourself not to deal with it.

For sake of your own argument, you retranslated “transgression/s” to “blunder/s”… that was not needed, other than to prop up this weaker or stronger argument you were peddling with regards to forgiveness… I said it then and I’ll say it now — you’ve simply muddied the waters.

Let me reiterate…

Paul makes NO distinction with regards to God’s redemptive forgiveness between SINS or TRANSGRESSIONS. Both are fully dealt with and covered and nowhere is “repentance” said to be a requirement for such to be effective and true, i.e., forgiveness is an established reality which carries much grace, of which repentance can have its place in unlocking some of that blessing. Thus regardless of your grammatical interpolation, Paul makes plain from Eph 1:7 & Col 1:14 that said transgressions (unintentional blunders) have been unilaterally dealt with on the same plane as sin — it’s right there in the text i.e., I’m not making stuff up.

Sorry Don if I’ve been a little caustic or blunt in some of my answers, but someone with your apparent acumen you should be able to see this, regardless of agreeing or in your case not. Not only this… but if you have chosen to hold unforgiveness in your heart simply because you have determined that someone in your estimation has lacked repentance towards you then YOU could be in need of searching your own heart.

Once again, Davo, I made no distinction between “sins” and “transgressions” when the latter was a translation of “παραβασις” (parabasis)—only when “transgressions” is a translation of “παραπτωμα” (paraptōma). I have explained that the first is a deliberate violation and the second unintentional—that the second could be correctly translated as “blunder”. Here is what I wrote about the two different nouns that have been translated as “transgressions”:

Again, a person cannot be delivered from a “παραπτωμα” (paraptōma), a blunder, because it is unintentional so that there is nothing from which to deliver him. Blunders are overlooked; intentional wrongdoing is corrected so that the sinner is delivered.

Rather than having “muddied the waters” as per your accusation, I have offered clarification. This you have rejected, and so I see no purpose in repeating myself nor in you repeating yourself. Thus, unless you offer some fresh argument that actually supports your position, I propose that we terminate this exchange.

A person certainly can…

I inadvertently and unintentionally “blunder” (transgression) onto publically restricted land. The powers-that-be become furious at my offence (sin), unwitting and ignorant though I was of such a contravention until such time of my apprehension.

An offence remains an offence regardless of my ignorance, and yet when confronted with my “unintentional blunder” I apologise profusely for my “unintentional blunder” and say… “I am sorry for this blunder; I will never commit such a blunder again!” — my ACTIONS in NEVER offending in kind again will show I have repented of said “unintentional blunder”.

Your whole rationale is a sieve… will I continue filling this hole? Bottom line is… forgiveness from God sometimes involves repentance on man’s part and sometimes not; His grace is sufficient for both.

Two scenarios:

1. I’m driving along when a large spider jumps onto my face and distracts me. Whilst distracted I unintentionally kill a girl on a zebra crossing. I am sorry and feel guilt for what I have unintentionally done. Forgiveness from the child’s parents may help me.

2. This time I am speeding (no distracting spider) and I unintentionally kill a child on a zebra crossing. The child’s parents are Christian and forgive me.

Are both of these scenarios describing “παραπτωμα” because in both cases I would imagine that forgiveness might bring some deliverance?

Who you gonna believe… Paidion or Paul?

This is what happens when context is ignored… I said that in regards to Eph 1:7 & Col 1:14.

Those are excellent examples, Pilgrim. I agree that in both cases your acts of killing a child would be unintentional, and therefore qualify as “παραπτωμα”. The parents may “forgive” you in the sense that they do not hold your unintentional act against you. They don’t require you to “pay” by bringing you to a court of law in order to force you to make heavy recompense. Certainly this “forgiveness” would bring some deliverance to you in the sense of delivering you from an obligation that you could never fully meet. As a consequence you might also be delivered from the emotional guilt you would probably feel in never being able to “make it up” to the parents—for you can never restore the lives of the children.

When I said, in the case of a blunder, that there is nothing from which you can be delivered, I meant that there was no WRONGDOING from which you could be delivered, since your deed was not intentional. In rethinking the matter after having read your post, I believe I went too far when I said that this kind of “forgiveness” is “overlooking the blunder.” Your blunder resulted in the death of children, and such a serious consequence would not be overlooked. Yet, the parents didn’t require you either to “pay for your mistake” or hold it against you forever. If THIS is the meaning of “forgiveness without repentance” that is being considered, then I agree that such “forgiveness without repentance” is possible and often occurs.

You can feel sorry for what you have done and express your sorrow to the parents. But sorrow is not repentance. “Repentance” is “having a change of heart and mind.” One can repent only of intentional wrong doing. And you can be delivered from the practice of intentional wrongdoing, if you repent of it.

Yet Jesus says if your brother repents 490 times a day, forgive him, so “a change of heart and mind” is hard to discern and define by outward evidence. Most people would say, on about the 20th time-“You have not repented at all”, yet, our Lord presents a different, more complex possibility. So in some cases, repentance begets forgiveness. In some cases, forgiveness begets repentance. IMO, All deliverance can be traced to the forgiveness offerred by Jesus Christ on the cross.

For instance, where is the line between grace, mercy and forgiveness. These are different words, in any language, but are they different things? Or are they elements of one thing. All apsects of love certainly, and all express the imparation of love to the unworthy.

All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. Eph 2

But God proves His love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Ro 5:8

That is the bottom line!

490 times a day! Wow! What translation are you using? The New Multiplicative Version?

This is what I read:
"…and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.” (Luke 17:4 ESV)

However, I am sure you are thinking of the following text, and that your mind somehow integrated it with the text in Luke:

Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven. (Matthew 18:21,22 ESV)

But Jesus doesn’t indicate that those 490 times occur in a single day. Besides, this is probably a figurative way of saying that one should forgive a person as often as he truly repents. Hyperbole.

Yeh. Go ahead and roll your eyes, Davo. There’s no conflict whatever between Paul’s statements and my own. I have upheld the concept of true forgiveness of wrongdoing as a response to repentance as Jesus taught, and Paul never contradicted Jesus’ teachings.

You have often emphasized the importance of context, Davo, and I fully agree that context is a key to understanding statements of any kind, including those made by people in our present day. In quoting the verse you quoted above, one should at least quote the rest of the sentence (vs 14):

And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

As you have so clearly indicated, “trespasses” in this context is “παραπτωμα”, a word which, in its plural form, I have translated as “blunders”.
But in this context, the word may refer to “trespasses” in the usual sense. For we (Paul and both Jews and Gentiles) are forgiven “by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.” The people to whom he was writing, were uncircumcised Gentiles. They didn’t know how to keep the Mosaic law as some Jewish Christians thought they should. They may have tried—blundering around, but failed. Paul is showing that under the new order in Christ, they are under no obligation to keep the Mosaic law; Jesus’ disciples are circumcised in heart. This is true, not only for Gentiles, but for Jews, also, who have become disciples of the Anointed One, and are now no longer under the Mosaic law but under the law of Christ (the Anointed One).

The “legal demands” of the law required punishment for non-conformity, even if unintentional. But under the new order this conformity is no longer required. So God “cancels the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.” There is absolutely no obligation under the new order to keep the Mosaic law, either for Jews or Gentiles. Jesus “set aside” these legal demands “nailing it to the cross”, a figure of speech to indicate that under the new order, there was no obligation to keep them. In this way they were “forgiven”, that is “set free” from these “legal demands.” Paul said (vs 16) Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath."

In a situation like this, I can now see how you, Davo, with your understanding, can believe that “forgiveness” means “deliverance.” In this case, Christians are “delivered” from the obligation to fulfill the legal demands of the Mosaic law.

Paidion wrote:

I really don’t want to get back into this debate but…
The problem is Don, you are holding that forgiveness without repentance as an absolute. I personally feel sorry for you. I myself see the grace and mercy of our one and only God as an absolute and worthy of our worship. Your (maybe anal?) responses have shown where your head is at.

I just hope that those who are reading these threads are understanding that you are not the guru that you pretend to be, and that there are other objective(and positive) possibilities to scriptural understanding.

We have a God that has totally loved us beside our faults, sins, worries, misguided steps etc… He wants us to know who He is and to know His love for us.

Love will never fail, and God is Love.

… but you want to get in your share of personal attacks.

If you had read my most recent post thoroughly, you would see that I had learned something by closely examining the text that Davo quoted.
Like most people, I can learn best when people respectfully express their disagreement and justify it with scripture. It is difficult to learn while being attacked. Probably if I were humble enough, I still could, and not retaliate in kind. But I have a ways to go in that regard.

Pilgrim’s post was like a breath of fresh air, and the tenor of it helped me to consider the point he was making and appreciate it.

I am not sure why you said the above. Do you think these statements are contrary to my understanding? They exactly express my own belief.

I am a seeker after truth and reality. I post to this forum for one basic reason—in the hope that we can all learn more by sharing our thoughts. I have no idea why you are stating that I pretend to be a guru. There is no basis for such an idea. If you are trying to express hatred, just go ahead and express it, rather than use this convoluted accusation.