In 1588, Protestant Reformer William Whitaker, Regius Professor of Divinity and Master of St. John’s College in the University of Cambridge, finished the task of answering the anti-scriptural assertions of the Jesuits Thomas Stapleton and Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, infamous defenders of the almost infinite doctrinal errors of the Roman Catholic Church, whose Society of Jesus was dedicated to destroying the Protestant Reformation.
The Cambridge University Chancellor had assigned Whitaker this controversial challenge as a man more than capable of delivering the Protestant response, due to the breadth and depth of his knowledge of not only the false arguments used by these Jesuits, but also those used by their fellow Jesuits, who frequently cited the Early Church Fathers as witnesses to support their teachings.
Whitaker’s 700-page Latin treatise was translated and published by the Parker Society in 1849, along with numerous volumes of the writings of the many illustrious English Reformed theologians, for the express purpose of placing scripturally truthful teaching in the hands of the common citizen in order to combat the rise of the Oxford Movement, whose goal was to replace Protestant doctrines with Roman Catholic doctrines in the English Church.
The title of Whitaker’s work is A Disputation on Holy Scripture Against the Papists, Especially Bellarmine and Stapleton. There were six primary points addressed:
1. The number of canonical and truly inspired books of Scripture.
2. Their claim the Latin Vulgate translation is superior to that of the original Hebrew and Greek.
3. Their claim the authority of Scripture depends upon the testimony of the Church, without which Scripture alone has no authority.
4. Their claim the Scriptures are so obscure that, rather than causing all men to study them with diligence and perseverance, they cause the common man to hate and revile them.
5. Their claim that Scripture is not the interpreter of Scripture, but rather the Pope is its sole judge and interpreter.
6. They claim the doctrines contained in Scripture incomplete without the innumerable unwritten traditions which they frequently hold as superior and of greater import than God’s Word.
Under the 6th head, Whitaker answers Stapleton’s argument that “neither is faith in Christ as Mediator ever written of in the whole Old Testament” (p. 612). This is one of the very arguments our Baptist friend, Darryl, uses in his quest to dismiss the notion of a Gospel of Christ preached and taught in the Old Testament which has sufficient ‘light’ to convert the sinner.
Whitaker responds:
“Who can tolerate such an assertion as this, that the faith of Christ is nowhere found in the whole Old Testament? Why then does Christ affirm the scriptures testify of Him? Or why did the apostles establish the Christian faith by the old Testament, and the [early church] fathers say that the new Testament was hidden in the old?........[T]he whole of the Gospel itself may be found in the books of Moses……[T]he apostles prove their gospel by the books of the old Testament; and Christ says, John 5, ‘Search the scriptures….for they testify of me.’……[A]ll the dogmas and heads of the gospel are found in the old Testament, not in the universal merely, but also in the particular; not only implicitly, but explicitly, although not so plainly and perspicuously. If we run through all the articles of our faith, we shall find them all, even in the particular, in the old Testament – as that God is the Creator of heaven and earth, that Christ is the Son of a virgin, and so forth. All these are predicted in the old Testament and the accomplishment related in the new.
“But they will say, perhaps, that the sacraments of the new Testament cannot be found in the old; for this occurs to me as I ponder the subject. Yet they can. For the sea and rock prefigured baptism, and manna the Eucharist, as the apostle testifies, 1 Cor. 10. Otherwise the apostles could not have proved all the dogmas which they propounded out of the old Testament. Now it is certain the apostles confirmed all they said by its authority. Consequently, the Bereans searched the scriptures (Acts 17) to see whether those things which Paul preached were so…… If the many testimonies of old Testament scripture were not cited, the apostles could never have persuaded the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah……. Christ and the apostles always appeal to the scriptures, urge the scriptures, expound the scriptures………Paul says, Acts 16:22, that he said ‘nothing but what Moses and the prophets did say.’ So Christ, Luke 26:27, ‘beginning at Moses and all the prophets, expounded in all the scriptures the things concerning Himself.’ And Romans 1:2, Paul says the gospel was promised in the prophets….The whole gospel is no less perfectly in the old than in the new Testament, though not so perspicuously.”
Whitaker then addresses Bellarmine’s argument concerning the alleged obscure nature of the Scriptures which necessarily requires the Church as their interpreter, since she alone is the pillar of truth and bride of Christ. For had all things been clearly and plainly written “all, even heretics, pagans and Jews, would understand as much of the mysteries of our faith as we do ourselves.”
Whitaker responds:
“Firstly, I confess the church is the pillar of truth, the bride of Christ, and intimately acquainted with the secrets of God; but I confirm these and other encomiums [i.e., high praises] of the church belong only to the elect and the faithful, not to the whole multitude of those who profess the Christian religion and the external worship of God: for these have not universally a union with Christ. Secondly, I reply that the knowledge and understanding of scripture is twofold: one of the letter, and the other of the Spirit. As to the former kind of knowledge, it is no privilege of the church; for even the impious can attain to this knowledge as well as the pious……Yea, the devil himself, who exceeds all men in wickedness, exceeds them also in knowledge. But as to the other sort of knowledge, which is of the Spirit, the church hath in this its greatest privilege. I mean the body of the elect; for they only are taught of God, they only understand the scriptures aright. The rest hearing hear not, seeing see not, and reading understand not.
“In Luke 8:10, Christ says to His disciples, ‘To you,’ that is, the faithful, ‘is given to understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God; but to the rest speak I in parables, that seeing they may not see and hearing they may not understand.’ And, 1 Cor. 2:14, Paul says that ‘the natural man receiveth not the things of God…..’ We also say in like manner that the scriptures cannot be understood by all, and yet should be set before all. So Christ proposed his parables to all, though he only explained them to his disciples. For the true interpretation of scripture is granted only to the elect and faithful.”
CONCLUSION: Steaver and Darryl, though sincere and well-intentioned they may be, are gravely misguided, as are innumerable other professing Christians, by discounting the need for regeneration by the sovereign grace of God through His Spirit, whether Old Testament or New, before men can attain to saving faith in the promises of Christ to come or in Christ who has come.
