Turret wrote:
Calvinists affirm what Paul taught in Romans 5, that Adam's guilt was imputed to his family, just as Christ's righteousness is imputed to his family.
Roman 5:12
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned— 13 (For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.
First let's analyze the text of verse 12.
The word
sinned in verse 12 is an action word and the tense is past tense.
According to Meriam webster dictionary the meaning of sinned is the ff:
1 : to commit a sin
2 : to commit an offense or fault
Therefore, just through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin: This phrase tells us that sin entered the world through Adam that's all, it does not say that we have been infected with sin.
and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned:
This phrase is the most misunderstood phrase in the bible. It says that death spread to all men and then followed by "because all sinned".
Read this carefully, the reason sin spread to all men is because all sinned.
Now we have to determine to whom the word ALL was referring to. This is easy, the world ALL is referring to those who have sinned but who are these people who have sinned. This people are the people who are capable of doing this action ( sinned). I described the meaning of sinned at the beginning of this post go back and take a look again.
Now the big question: Are babies capable of performing this action ( sinned )?. Well, the answer is no. Babies are not capable of performing the action "sinned" therefore Paul was not referring to babies when he used the word ALL because Paul knew that babies are not capable of sinning.