Saints preamble

As long since promised, here is the start of some of my thoughts (or at least an outline of my plan of attack) in reply to the question posed long ago in response to the following post:

Pride is the deification of self, and this today in some of us is not the order of the Pharisee, but of the publican. To say "Oh, I'm no saint," is acceptable to human pride, but it is unconscious blasphemy against God. It literally means that you defy God to make you a saint, "I am much too weak and hopeless." Humility before men may be unconscious blasphemy before God. Why are you not a saint? It is either that you do not want to be a saint, or that you do not believe God can make you one.
Oswald Chambers from My Utmost for His Highest (June 12th)

The question was:
What does it mean to be a saint?

Well, this is a good question...
I think sainthood has many facets and thus can be answered on many different levels (However, I am not implying that I am capable of answering it on all levels!).

At this time I am neither capable nor interested in addressing the issue of the Church’s varying positions (Catholic, Protestant, Catholic v Protestant..) through the ages on this topic so I shall completely ignore the church history side of the issue.

Also the question of what it is like to live as a saint can only be understood once the Bible's view on who is a saint is explored.

So we must start with the Bible (always a great place to start anything). I’ve looked up references of saints in the Bible. The word “saint” occurs 95 times.

I am no Hebrew/Greek/Aramaic scholar so I don’t have a clear definition of what the root word behind what is translated in the KJV as “saints”. However, it seems to be used in the same or very similar context(s) as many of the quotes overlap in meaning throughout. Also between the OT and the NT there seems to be a continuation of the same idea.

I will continue this later with a start at some references and the question of who is being refered to as a saint in scriptures.