πᾶς (pas) in Romans 3:4: Adjective Nominative Singular Masculine
πᾶς (pas) in Romans 3:4
Textual Witness
The witness reads πᾶς in Romans 3:4 within the clause πᾶς δὲ ἄνθρωπος ψεύστης.
How The Form Affects Interpretation
The form gives the sentence broad, representative force: it makes the claim about humanity inclusive in scope while remaining dependent on the surrounding contrast.
How To Communicate It
In communication, it is best rendered with a comprehensive idea such as every or all, but the final sense should still follow the verse's contrast and flow.
What Not To Say
- Grammatical form should serve context, not override it.
- Do not treat grammatical gender as a theological gender claim.
- Do not overread case, number, or gender beyond what the verse context supports.
What Does The Label Mean?
Adjective: the word functions to describe or qualify a noun, here giving a generalizing force to the idea of a person.
Nominative: the form is marked for a nominative role and here stands in the clause as part of the subject-like assertion.
Singular: the form is grammatically singular in this occurrence and points to one human as a representative case.
Masculine: the form is in the masculine grammatical class, which matches the surrounding noun and does not by itself make a theological claim.
What The Form Does In This Verse
It attaches to ἄνθρωπος in the phrase πᾶς δὲ ἄνθρωπος ψεύστης.
The surrounding clause uses it to describe the human subject as a whole or in representative terms, not as a separate standalone idea.
It qualifies ἄνθρωπος with a universal or comprehensive sense, so the statement contrasts God's truth with human falsehood in general.
It does not introduce a new subject, and it does not by itself shift the meaning of ἄνθρωπος into another lexical category.
How Much The Form Matters Here
High: The adjective gives representative universality to the contrast between God's truth and human falsehood.
Nominative singular modifier of man. qualifies the human subject as every person in the contrast. Attached to ἄνθρωπος. Governed by agreement with the nominative noun phrase. The form marks broad human scope; the contrast with God controls the force of the line.
How broad is the human side of the contrast? The adjective marks every man as the representative human side of the statement.
Direct: The form directly supports a rendering such as every man or every person in the contrast.
The masculine singular form is representative in context and should not be narrowed to males only.
Masculine singular means only male persons: The form agrees with ἄνθρωπος in a representative statement; the context gives the human contrast.
How The Interpretation Is Derived
The witness reads πᾶς in Romans 3:4 within the clause πᾶς δὲ ἄνθρωπος ψεύστης.
The lemma πᾶς normally carries the sense of all, every, or the whole, and here it serves as a broad qualifier.
Its nominative masculine singular form agrees with ἄνθρωπος and helps present the statement as a general verdict about humanity.
The verse says that God is true, while every human being is false, so the grammar supports a sweeping contrast in the argument.
This fits the passage's larger insistence that God's words stand firm even when human speech and judgment fail.
For readers and teachers, the form helps communicate total contrast and rhetorical force without needing to overstate a technical parsing.
Do not derive a special theological doctrine from masculine gender, and do not treat the form as if it changes the sense beyond the context.