The Bible says more than you've been told.

Week 1  |  Issue #1  |  Sinful Nature Series (1 of 4)

The phrase "sinful nature" appeared 23 times in the 1984 NIV — one of the most widely read English Bibles in history. In 2011, the NIV translators quietly changed almost every instance back to "flesh." Why? Because the Greek never said "sinful nature" in the first place. 

The word in question is sarx (σάρξ). It appears 147 times in the New Testament. Paul uses it extensively in Romans, Galatians, and Colossians. In every instance, the Greek word is the same: sarx. It means "flesh" — the physical body, human weakness, or the earthly perspective as opposed to the spiritual one. 

Here is the critical distinction: "flesh" describes a condition you live in. "Sinful nature" describes something you are born with. One is a circumstance. The other is an identity. The Greek says the first. The old NIV said the second. 

Sarx (σάρξ) 

In classical Greek, sarx (σάρξ) simply meant "meat" or "flesh" — the physical substance of the body. The New Testament authors, particularly Paul, expanded its usage into a theological concept, but they never abandoned the core meaning. Paul's use of sarx (σάρξ) operates on a spectrum: 

Physical body: "No one ever hated their own flesh (sarx)" — Ephesians 5:29. Here it plainly means the physical body.

Human limitation: "The flesh (sarx) is weak" — Matthew 26:41. Jesus is describing human frailty, not a corrupt nature.

Earthly orientation: "Those who live according to the flesh (sarx)" — Romans 8:5. Paul contrasts living focused on earthly desires versus living by the Spirit. This is a choice, not a birth defect. 

Notice what Paul never does: he never defines sarx (σάρξ) as an inherited condition passed from Adam to every human. That concept — sometimes called "original sin" or "total hereditary depravity" — is a theological framework built on top of the text, not from within it. 

Compare this with another key word: hamartia (ἁμαρτία), typically translated "sin." Its root meaning is "to miss the mark" — like an archer's arrow falling short of the target. It describes an action or a failing, not an inborn trait. When Paul writes "all have sinned (hamartia)" in Romans 3:23, the verb is active: everyone has missed the mark. He does not say everyone was born already missing it. 

The NIV's own translation committee acknowledged the problem. Douglas Moo, chair of the Committee on Bible Translation, explained the 2011 revision: "We came to agree that 'flesh' better represents the range of meaning of sarx (σάρξ)." The committee recognized that "sinful nature" was an interpretation, not a translation. 

John Gill (1697–1771), commenting on Galatians 5:19, connects "flesh" to the whole person acting apart from God's guidance — not to a defective nature inherited at birth. He writes that the works of the flesh are those things "which are done in and by the flesh, the corrupt nature of man." 

Note Gill's careful language: "corrupt nature" refers to a person's current moral state — shaped by environment, choice, and habit — not a genetically transmitted sin package from Adam. This distinction matters enormously. 

Albert Barnes reinforces this reading. On Romans 8:5, he explains that "after the flesh" describes people who "follow fleshly appetites and desires" — a pattern of living, not a factory setting. Barnes consistently treats Paul's flesh/Spirit contrast as a choice between two ways of life, not a description of two types of people (the cursed and the elected). 

Matthew Henry takes a similar line on Romans 7:18: "In me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." Henry notes that Paul identifies the flesh as a sphere of weakness, not as the totality of his being. Paul does not say "I am sinful nature." He says there is a part of human experience — the fleshly, earthly pull — that contains no good thing. The distinction is between a battlefield and a birth certificate. 

Ezekiel 18:20 — "The soul who sins, it shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father." This is God speaking through Ezekiel, and the principle is absolute: guilt is not inherited. If sin were a nature passed from Adam, this verse would be incoherent. 

James 1:14–15 — "Each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin." James describes sin as a process: desire leads to temptation leads to action. It is sequential and personal — not pre-installed. 

Deuteronomy 1:39 — "Your children who do not yet know good from bad..." God acknowledges a stage of life where children have not yet sinned. If sinful nature were inherited at conception, this verse would make no sense — they would already "know" sin by bearing it. 

Romans 5:12 — "Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned." The final phrase is crucial in the Greek: eph' hō pantes hēmarton (ἐφ' ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον) — "because all sinned." The verb is aorist active indicative. It describes a completed action performed by each person. Paul does not say "because all were made sinners" or "because all inherited sin." He says all sinned — actively, personally. 

The Bible teaches that humans struggle with the flesh — the pull of earthly desires, the weakness of the body, the temptation to choose self over God. That struggle is real, universal, and relentless. 

But the Bible does not teach that you were born guilty. It does not teach that Adam's sin was deposited into your DNA. It does not teach that infants are condemned before they draw breath. Those ideas come from theological traditions — some of them very old and very influential — but they do not come from the Greek text of the New Testament. 

The word is sarx (σάρξ). It means flesh. And knowing that changes everything about how you read Paul, how you understand salvation, and how you think about the nature of the God who made you.

Here is something most readers never notice: the King James Version (1611), the American Standard Version (1901), the English Standard Version (2001), and the New American Standard Bible all translate sarx as "flesh." For 400 years, English Bibles used "flesh."

Then in 1973, the NIV arrived — and changed sarx to "sinful nature" in 23 key verses. Overnight, millions of English readers encountered a phrase that sounded biblical but had no Greek equivalent. A generation of sermons, Bible studies, and systematic theologies were built on a phrase the original authors never wrote.

In 2011, the NIV quietly walked it back. Most of those 23 verses now read "flesh" again. But the doctrinal damage was done. Ask almost any churchgoer today what "sinful nature" means, and they will describe inherited guilt from Adam — a concept that depends entirely on a translation that no longer exists in the very Bible that introduced it.

The theology that followed. Once "sinful nature" entered the vocabulary, an entire chain of doctrine locked into place. If humans are born with a sinful nature, then infants are born guilty. If infants are born guilty, they need saving before they can choose. If they cannot choose, then God must choose for them. And if God chooses for them, then salvation is not a response to the gospel, it is a predetermined verdict handed down before birth. One translation choice paved the road from Augustine's original sin to Calvin's total depravity to the modern Calvinistic doctrine of unconditional election.

Those who built on it. Augustine of Hippo (354—430 AD) argued that Adam's guilt was transmitted to every human through procreation. He wrote: "The deliberate sin of the first man is the cause of original sin." John Calvin took it further: "We are so entirely controlled by the power of sin, that the whole mind, the whole heart, and all our actions are under its influence." Wayne Grudem's modern Systematic Theology states plainly: "We inherit a sinful nature from Adam." For these thinkers, the corruption is baked in, and you arrive with no guilt for your actions.

Those who pushed back. But this was never the only reading. The Eastern Orthodox tradition rejected Augustine's framework entirely, teaching that humans inherit mortality from Adam — not guilt. Alexander Campbell, a key figure in the Restoration Movement, wrote: "Sin is not a thing to be inherited. It is a personal act, and can only be committed by a moral agent." More recently, biblical scholar Gordon Fee noted in his commentary on Galatians: "Paul's use of sarx has nothing to do with a 'sinful nature' as though one were born with an inherently sinful bent." These voices span 1,500 years and multiple traditions, yet they share one conclusion: the text does not say what "sinful nature" implies.

Why it matters today. This is not an academic debate. If you believe humans are born with a sinful nature, you will read every passage about salvation, baptism, grace, and free will through that lens. You will conclude that people cannot choose God, that God must override their corrupt will first. But if you go back to the Greek and find sarx, flesh, and weakness, the earthly pull, you find a Bible that holds humans responsible for their own choices, that treats sin as something you do rather than something you are, and that presents salvation as a genuine invitation rather than a rigged outcome.

The lesson: Always check the original language. A single English word choice can build or demolish an entire theological framework. That is why tools like BibleWord.ai exist.

Until next time,