Annotation CLIX, Whether a man can be made impeccable (Psalm 15:7)

Annotatio CLIX

”Moreover, even till night my reins have corrected me.” — Psalm 15:7

Origen Origen, when he had come thus far in explaining, asserted that holy men, when they have come to the summit of the virtues, do not — not even at night — suffer those things which are of men [human passions], nor are tickled by any thought of vices. Jerome, in the epistle to Ctesiphon (which begins “Not boldly”), says that this passage is one of the fountains whence the Pelagians drew their error, teaching that a man can be made ἀναμάρτητον — that is, impeccable,¹ or able to be without any sin. See Annotation 232 of this book.