A Word-Study Chart · The Diagnosis & the Cure
hamartia · sin · literally, "to miss the mark"
the arrow that falls short of the glory of God — in every one of us
One word · three shades of one ruin
The New Testament's main word, ἁμαρτία (hamartia), means to miss the mark — to fall short of what God made us for (Rom 3:23). But Scripture uses three great Hebrew words together to show sin's full shape: חַטָּאת (chatta't, missing the mark), פֶּשַׁע (pesha, rebellion — willful transgression against rightful rule), and עָוֺן (avon, iniquity — a crookedness, a being-bent-out-of-true). David piles all three on one heap when he confesses (Ps 51:1–5).
So sin is not merely a list of bad deeds. It is an act (what we do), a nature (what we are, from birth), and a power (a master we serve) — "sin is lawlessness" (1 John 3:4), and "everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin" (John 8:34).
To see the cure rightly, we must see the disease honestly: what sin is, how it cuts us off from God, how it reaches every one of us through Adam, why we cannot cure ourselves, and why the old remedy could only ever be temporary.
Measured against Him, not against each other.
πάντες γὰρ ἥμαρτον καὶ ὑστεροῦνται τῆς δόξης τοῦ θεοῦ
pantes gar hēmarton … hysterountai tēs doxēs
…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
The standard is not the person beside us but the glory of God — and all of us "fall short." Sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4) and also the good left undone (Jas 4:17). It is both crossing a line and missing a mark.
The holy God and unholy sin cannot share a home.
כִּי אִם־עֲוֺנֹתֵיכֶם הָיוּ מַבְדִּלִים בֵּינֵכֶם לְבֵין אֱלֹהֵיכֶם
ki im avonoteichem hayu mavdilim
But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden His face from you.
Sin builds a wall. We are "dead in trespasses" (Eph 2:1), "alienated from the life of God" (Eph 4:18). And the breach is fatal: "the wages of sin is death" (Rom 6:23) — separation now, and forever, unless it is healed.
Not only what we do, but what we are, inherited from the first man.
δι' ἑνὸς ἀνθρώπου ἡ ἁμαρτία εἰς τὸν κόσμον εἰσῆλθεν
di' henos anthrōpou hē hamartia … eisēlthen
…through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.
Through Adam, our representative head, sin and death passed to the whole race: "by one man's disobedience the many were made sinners" (5:19). So David says, "in sin my mother conceived me" (Ps 51:5); "in Adam all die" (1 Cor 15:22). We are "by nature children of wrath" (Eph 2:3) — sinners by birth, not only by choice.
No scrubbing, no striving, no good deed can remove it.
וַנְּהִי כַטָּמֵא כֻּלָּנוּ וּכְבֶגֶד עִדִּים כָּל־צִדְקֹתֵינוּ
… ke-veged iddim kol tsidqoteinu
…we are all like one unclean, and all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags.
Even our best is stained. "Though you wash with lye … your iniquity is marked before Me" (Jer 2:22); "who can say, I have cleansed my heart?" (Prov 20:9); "by works of the law no flesh will be justified" (Rom 3:20). The dead cannot raise themselves (Eph 2:1). Religion, morality, and effort cannot reach the root.
A shadow that covered sin, but could never remove it.
ἀδύνατον γὰρ αἷμα ταύρων καὶ τράγων ἀφαιρεῖν ἁμαρτίας
adynaton … aphairein hamartias
…it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.
The law was only "a shadow" (10:1). The same sacrifices, repeated endlessly, "can never take away sins" (10:11) — they were a yearly reminder of sin (10:3), not its removal. Imposed "until the time of reformation" (9:10), that whole system was "growing old and ready to vanish" (8:13): temporary, and perishing by design.
This is the weight the whole Bible refuses to soften. Sin is not a quirk to be managed but a capital matter. Left unremoved, it does not simply trouble us — it condemns us. The diagnosis ends, apart from rescue, in death and judgment.
τὰ γὰρ ὀψώνια τῆς ἁμαρτίας θάνατος
ta opsōnia tēs hamartias thanatos
For the wages of sin is death … "if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins."
Sin pays a wage, and the wage is death — and Jesus warns of dying "in your sins" (John 8:24). This is the terror the gospel answers; the same verse goes on: "but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
ἀπόκειται τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἅπαξ ἀποθανεῖν, μετὰ δὲ τοῦτο κρίσις
… meta de touto krisis
…it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment.
Death is not the end of the reckoning. And the first lie about all this is denial: "if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves" (1 John 1:8). The honest soul stops excusing — and looks for a Savior.
Here the good news breaks like dawn. What the old system could only picture, Christ accomplished. He is "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29) — not covers it for a year, but lifts it off. With His own blood He entered once for all and "obtained eternal redemption" (Heb 9:12). His one offering did what rivers of animal blood never could.
HEBREWS 10:14 · THE END OF THE ENDLESS SACRIFICES
μιᾷ γὰρ προσφορᾷ τετελείωκεν εἰς τὸ διηνεκὲς τοὺς ἁγιαζομένους
For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.
"By one offering," "forever." And the covenant promise seals it: "their sins and lawless deeds I will remember no more" — and "where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin" (Heb 10:17–18; cf. Jer 31:34). The blood of Jesus "cleanses us from all sin" (1 John 1:7); our transgressions are removed "as far as the east is from the west" (Ps 103:12). John 1:29 — behold the Lamb. The debt is paid, the stain is washed, the verdict is reversed. This relief does not expire.
That all people are fallen in Adam is the consistent witness of Scripture and the historic confession of the whole church (Rom 5; Ps 51:5; Eph 2:3). Christians have described the mechanism in slightly different ways — some emphasizing that Adam, as our representative head, acted for us; others emphasizing a corrupted nature passed down; most holding both together. We need not settle every detail to affirm the plain reality: we are born with a bent toward sin and we each, freely and truly, sin (Rom 3:10–12).
Two guardrails keep this honest. First, Adam's headship does not erase personal responsibility — "the soul who sins shall die," each bearing his own guilt (Ezek 18:20). Second, this is never a counsel of despair: the same passage that says "in Adam all die" says "in Christ all shall be made alive" (1 Cor 15:22). What we inherited from the first Adam is more than answered by the last.
Scripture's vocabulary for sin is precise. חַטָּאת (chatta't) is missing — failing the target, like the Greek ἁμαρτία. פֶּשַׁע (pesha) is rebellion — a willful breaking away from rightful rule. עָוֺן (avon) is iniquity — a crookedness, a being twisted out of true. Together they show sin is not one thing: it is failure, defiance, and distortion all at once. That is why no single self-help can fix it — and why the cure had to reach the root.
The Hebrew word for atonement, כָּפַר (kaphar), carries the sense of covering. That is exactly what the old sacrifices did — they covered sin and rolled it forward, year by year, a perpetual "reminder of sins" (Heb 10:3). But of Jesus it is said He takes away sin (John 1:29, αἴρω, to lift and carry off) and God will "remember it no more" (Heb 10:17). That is the whole difference between the temporary and the permanent: the old covered; the New removes.
| Truth | Key texts |
|---|---|
| What sin is | Rom 3:23; 1 John 3:4; Jas 4:17; Ps 51:1–5 |
| It separates | Isa 59:2; Eph 2:1; 4:18; Col 1:21; Rom 6:23 |
| Through Adam | Rom 5:12, 18–19; Ps 51:5; 1 Cor 15:21–22; Eph 2:3 |
| No self-cure | Isa 64:6; Jer 2:22; 13:23; Prov 20:9; Rom 3:20 |
| Old covenant: temporary | Heb 10:1–4, 11; 9:9–10; 8:13 |
| New covenant: permanent | Heb 10:10, 12, 14, 17–18; 9:12; John 1:29; 1 John 1:7 |