The Sages Knew the Problem
The Sages knew the problem as well. In Talmud Bavli Shabbat 146a, the nachash in Gan Eden is said to have cast a zuhamah, a defilement, into Chavah. The Gemara then teaches that Israel's zuhamah ceased when they stood at Har Sinai, while the zuhamah of the nations did not cease.
Romans 3:9 answers that tradition directly. Shaul, himself a talmid of the Tanna Rabban Gamliel, says Sinai gave Israel the Torah, but the Torah did not lift the yoke of chet. In 3:20 he adds that through the Torah, that "worketh ketzef/za'am" (Ro 1:18; 4:15), comes the knowledge of chet.
The Jew at the Rebbe's table and the savage warrior in the forest carry the same inheritance of lostness and peril from Adam.
A Defilement Cast into Chavah
מִפְּנֵי מָה עוֹבְדֵי כּוֹכָבִים מְזוֹהָמִין? שֶׁבְּשָׁעָה שֶׁבָּא נָחָשׁ עַל חַוָּה הֵטִיל בָּהּ זוּהֲמָא. יִשְׂרָאֵל שֶׁעָמְדוּ עַל הַר סִינַי — פָּסְקָה זוּהֲמָתָן. עוֹבְדֵי כּוֹכָבִים שֶׁלֹּא עָמְדוּ עַל הַר סִינַי — לֹא פָּסְקָה זוּהֲמָתָן.
Why are the nations defiled? Because when the serpent came upon Chavah, he cast a defilement into her. Israel, who stood at Har Sinai: their defilement ceased. The nations, who did not stand at Har Sinai: their defilement did not cease.
Filth, foulness, a residue that clings. The Sages place its origin not in a single act of Adam but in something injected into the mother of all living, and so passed to every generation.
"It ceased, it was cut off." The Gemara claims a decisive break at Sinai: the giving of the Torah ended the inherited defilement for those who stood there.
In this baraita Sinai functions as a cleansing event. The Gemara even asks about gerim, and answers that though they were not there, their mazal was present.
The Sages and Shaul agree on the diagnosis: something entered humanity in the Gan. They differ on the cure.
Sinai Gave the Torah. It Did Not Lift the Yoke.
Shaul was trained "at the feet of Gamliel" (Ac 22:3), in the very academy whose heirs would set down such traditions. When he writes Romans 3, he is not arguing from outside the beis midrash. He takes up its question in its own terms and returns a different verdict.
προῃτιασάμεθα γὰρ Ἰουδαίους τε καὶ Ἕλληνας πάντας ὑφ᾽ ἁμαρτίαν εἶναι.
For we have already charged that both Yehudim and Yevanim, all of them, are under chet.
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Ro 3:9
"All under chet"
Hyph' hamartian: under the dominion of chet, as under a yoke or a master. Not "Yevanim only," as the baraita would have it, but Yehudim te kai Yevanim, both alike.
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Ro 3:10–18 · Tehillim 14:1–3; 53:2–4
The witness of the Ketuvim
Shaul calls Dovid HaMelech to testify: אֵין עֹשֵׂה־טוֹב אֵין גַּם־אֶחָד, "there is none that does good, not even one." The catena is drawn from the Sefarim that Israel itself received.
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Ro 3:19
Spoken to those under the Torah
Whatever the Torah says, it says to those "in the Torah." The indictment of the Psalms is addressed first to the people who stood at Sinai, so that every mouth is stopped.
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Ro 3:20 · Tehillim 143:2
The knowledge of chet
Echoing כִּי לֹא־יִצְדַּק לְפָנֶיךָ כָל־חָי, Shaul says no flesh is justified by works of the Torah; through the Torah comes epignōsis hamartias, the full knowledge of chet. Sinai diagnosed the zuhamah. It did not remove it.
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Ro 5:12
Through one man
The inheritance runs back past Sinai, past Avraham, to Adam: through one man chet entered the world, and death through chet, and so death passed to all.
διότι ἐξ ἔργων νόμου οὐ δικαιωθήσεται πᾶσα σὰρξ ἐνώπιον αὐτοῦ, διὰ γὰρ νόμου ἐπίγνωσις ἁμαρτίας.
For by works of the Torah no flesh will be justified before Him, for through the Torah comes the knowledge of chet.
Ketzef and Za'am
If Sinai did not end the zuhamah, what did the Torah accomplish? Shaul answers twice, and both answers concern wrath.
ὁ γὰρ νόμος ὀργὴν κατεργάζεται.
For the Torah works wrath.
Ἀποκαλύπτεται γὰρ ὀργὴ θεοῦ ἀπ᾽ οὐρανοῦ.
For the wrath of Hashem is being revealed from Shomayim.
The wrath that breaks out when the boundaries of the Mishkan and the commandment are crossed (Bamidbar 1:53; 18:5; Yehoshua 22:20). It is the fitting word for Ro 4:15: the Torah draws the line, and the crossing of it brings ketzef.
Indignation, Hashem's sentence of denunciation against the wicked (Yeshayahu 10:5; Daniel 8:19). Shaul's skeuē orgēs in Ro 9:22 echoes כְּלֵי זַעְמוֹ, "the vessels of His za'am" (Yeshayahu 13:5; Yirmeyahu 50:25).
The baraita treats Sinai as the place where the defilement stopped. Shaul treats Sinai as the place where the defilement was named, measured, and brought under sentence. The Torah is kadosh and the mitzvah is kadosh, tzaddik, and tov (Ro 7:12); precisely because it is holy, it exposes chet and works ketzef and za'am against it.
The Nachash Again
Shaul does not leave the serpent behind. In Romans 7:11 he writes that chet, seizing an opportunity through the mitzvah, ἐξηπάτησέν με, "deceived me." It is the verb he uses of the nachash and Chavah in 2 Corinthians 11:3, and it answers Chavah's own confession in Bereshis 3:13: הַנָּחָשׁ הִשִּׁיאַנִי, "the nachash deceived me." The Gemara says the nachash cast its zuhamah into Chavah; Shaul says the same deceiver works through the commandment itself in every child of Adam, Jew included.
The Rebbe's Table and the Forest
The Jew at the Rebbe's Table
He has the Torah, the covenants, the avos, the service, the promises (Ro 9:4–5). His people stood at Sinai. He knows the mitzvos and keeps them with love.
Yet he is under chet (Ro 3:9).
The Warrior in the Forest
He has never heard of Sinai. He has only the witness of creation (Ro 1:20) and the Torah written on the heart, with a conscience that accuses or excuses (Ro 2:14–15).
Yet he is under chet (Ro 3:9).
both carry the same inheritance of lostness and peril from Adam
The Kapporet Set Forth
Having closed every mouth, Shaul opens a door in the next breath. Apart from the Torah, yet witnessed by the Torah and the Nevi'im, the tzedakah of Hashem has been revealed, through emunah in Moshiach Yeshua, for all who believe (Ro 3:21–22). Hashem set Him forth as a hilastērion (Ro 3:25), the very word the Septuagint uses for the כַּפֹּרֶת, the kapporet over the Aron on Yom Kippur.
What the baraita sought at Sinai, Shaul finds at the Kapporet: not a defilement that ceased for one people, but a covering offered to all who are under chet, Yehudi first and also the Yevani.