The theological bankruptcy of Sola Scriptura

Kiffen,
Thanks for the kind words. I have appreciated your reasonable posts as well, even if we haven't always agreed. I have seen the reformedcatholicism website in the past and read a couple of the articles. (I recognized Tim Enloe's name from his stent with NTMin.org and some of this online debates with Roman .) I'll give it another look.

 

I concur.

 

The problem there is MEN, not the Bible as a sole authority; and what you two fail to understand is that if MEN were so bad at maintaining a consistent interpretation of written scriptures; then HOW MUCH WORSE would they be at "oral tradition" as well as the abuse of Church authority! You just cannot get away from the human problem; and all you are doing is trying to subject one group of humans to another based on seniority (a very worldly means as it is). But they are all still human!

That's true; and you have to assume the Church of the second and later centuries was THE SAME as "the Church" of the apostles. You say "they must be because they were so close, and the traditions passed down"; but how can we prove this? How can we prove that they didn;t change the traditions? We can't, but must take it on "faith"; but now the faith becomes in men, and we elevate this one group of men.

But 100 years is still a long time. If you speak to descendants of a person 100 years alter (several generations); then things start getting cloudy. Some details are forgotten; while speculation and romanticization set in. (Just look at most conservatives portrayal of early American culture.

 

And neither was it in the context of second century gnosticism and other Greek, Roman, and even Persian philosophy. It was warned about, though, and prophesied to make an inroads into the Church.
But this once again is nothing more than seniority. They were closer; so there; they had it all right, and they are somehow more honorable and less fallible just for being born at this closer time than those lowly 16th century people. But just look t it this way. There was no rip in tha fabric of spacetime between the first two centuries and the 16th. There wa sno cosmic singularity that interrputed the sequence of history. The first century led to the second century, which eventually led all the way up to the 16th century. Now; if the second century people had it all together, and the 16th century people were so off; then still; the fall into error had to occur somewhere. If being in the next century guarantees perfect adherance of the doctrine and practice; then the 3rd century people must have been perfect as well. And if they were; then the fourth century as well. And the fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th. Especially since as those centuries went on, the church authority became stronger and tighter, with the councils and everything. Of course; you can take the conspiratorial approach of those "premodernists" (including the ones with the rosy view of American history) and claim that all of a sudden, the Enlightenment, with its "rationalism" and "humanism" and everything just sprang up and ruied it all. But this too did not form in a vacuum. What caused this revolt and break from the stranglhold of that single Church authority?
Already, we have the great rift of the 11th century. Where did this come from; if the Church was all long faithfully maintaining the traditions; and it was only those 16th century rationalists who wrecked it all; then why these problems before hand? Why the Waldensians? Are all of these people heretics? Remember; this would iclude the Eastern Church as well! Even though technically; it was the West (as a single patriarchate) that broke from the [other four in] the East; still; the West had already been recognized as the authority. So before you get to those 16th century rebels; you have to address these 11th century ones, who at least one of you claims should be the real single church authority.
You for some reason think that the 11th century defectors had the right interpretation compared to the authority of Rome. But now you are in the same bind as the Protestants. You're going by your reason and interpretation instead of just trusting that God's Church was right. Even something like filioque; even if it wasn;t mentioned earlier; it could have been an even more sectret tradition or something. Even if it wasn't; if God's inspired Church heirarchy decided that was the best expression of Christology; then who is even four fifths of the Church to decide otherwise?
the only other option is to admit that that central authority had changed over the centuries, and was adding to the original faith. But once again; we are back to when this began. If the second century perfectly continued the first; then why couldn't it continue up to the 11th?

And once again; the same with Rome's interpretations matching yours.
Who can know; if we are going to set up some human Church heirarchy to receive the Word of God for us? THIS is where all the schism and interpretational dispute comes from; not just a handful of 16th century leaders. The ball was rolling long before then.

And I'm sure Rome says that about the East.
When we leave the solid written record, and go into the vapor of tradition; then people are free to teach anything they want, and it cannot be proven or disproven.

So that means that the supernatural transformation of bread and wine into actual flesh and blood just always happened to be left out. As was the supernatural power of baptismal water, and all the stuff about Mary. Funny how all of these questionable doctrines were always left out. You'd think stuff like that would be confusing to people, and raise questions; which would then be addressed. IT seems with all the issues that come up in the NT; that is enough to tell us all that we need to know to keep the NT faith. Anything of importance naturally came up and became an issue, so to speculate on a whole set of unwritten doctrine and practice can only serve the purpose to bring in unsupported doctrines that could not be substantiated by any other means. Once again; we can claim anything, and who can prove it? By what the second century fathers said? We first propose that this doctrine was taught by the NT because the second century claimed it was apostolic tradition. But how do we prove that this was actually aprt of that tradition? Because the second century fathers said so! So we see that it IS a cyclical argument!

The traditions would then become apart of the scripture, so it would never be an issue of "how long" they are to be kept! There is no reason to surmise that these "Traditions" would be anything more than the teachings, or at least principles we see preserved in the texts.

And you don't consider that the Holy Spirit could guide the canonization of scripture without continuing to correct every area of the Church. I wish He had; but obviously He didn't, as once again; it did eventually change (to a level even you do not accept); so at some point; the Holy Spirit stopped inspiring Church doctrine. The Scripture was to then guide the Church, but as men wanted to maintain their own traditions and philosophy and mix it with the Gospel; they had to come up with this idea that church authority; and some unwritten; untestable "apostolic tradition" was just as authoritative as scripture. Now, there was no way to correct whatever doctrine and practice the Church authority came up with. Still; it gets so bad, that the Waldensians protest; the entire Eadt breaks off, and then the Protestants. Why did the Holy Spirit stop directly inspiring doctrine and leave it up to men and their devices? Perhaps to fulfill prophecy of the Church's apostasy, and however this comes to play in any future propetic events.

On the other hand, if you want to talk about the Holy Spirit; then maybe consider that it was that same Spirit that would guide men back to the truth after centuries of shifting sands of church authority and ever changing untestable traditions.
In all cases; what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If the 16th century could go astray, then so could the second. They were no less human. And if God could continue to guide the second; He could also guide the 16th. They were no less Christian. There is just no warrant from scripture, tradition or history to elevate the second centuury as such perfect preservers of the truth, and attribute all error only to later centuries.

There were people who used the Clements and Barnabas, and even a few of the other works from that period as scripture. They certainly do look like scripture at first glance. And I think I did read of some disputes over it. So once again; God inspired the canon in spite of themselves.

Those issues themselves aren't cultural, but culture often did play a part in the organizations that formed around them, and over time they became cultural as they became associated with the culture that held them. For instance; both the Baptist and Mennonite churches came out of anaptism. While the Dutch anabaptists became Mennonite; the English did not want to become something that they associated with this other culture. So they adopted the name Baptist. (You can read this in the Handbook of Denominations" history of the Baptist church). Now the two churches may have some different doctrines, but the division started as mainly cultural. The same thing with any difference between the Anglican and Catholic; and between the Greek and Roman.

 

Clearly this is not the real issue at hand. If the Holy Spirit desired to guard "oral tradition" from error, then "oral tradition" would be guarded from error, for 20 years, 200, 2000, 2 million.

You are framing the question as to which is the easier method to limit the amount of error introduced by fallible men, and the answer to that question is no doubt a written text. But the Catholic and Orthodox Churches would not accept that framing. They would argue that the Holy Spirit is equally capable of protecting both written and oral teachings, and of insuring that the chosen agents of interpretation of those teachings will never interpret them in error. That's a totally different situation.

Fallible men will introduce error into any form of teaching. Men or organizations protected by the Holy Spirit will never introduce error into any form of teaching. The Holy Spirit didn't run out of "infallibility power" after 90AD.

 

I believe others have already pointed this out, but your reasoning is circular at best and is based on unfounded and biased assumptions.
The basis of what you say is based on this statement:
the NT in particular was written, edited, compiled and discerned by the Church and therefore the Church must have the primary interpretative role.
That statement has some false assumptions in it.
What church are you talking about?
The one that Peter was the "pope" of. Sorry, there was none.
The Catholic Church? Again you fail. The RCC never came into existence until the fourth century.
What Church are you referring to? The Church of Christ (Cambellites) claim it was their church. Are they right in their assertion?
Which church are you referring to? To refer to any one individual "church" is an unwarranted and false assumption. There was no one universal church, so to speak. The word "church" used in a universal sense is wrong. The word simply means congregation or assembly. Once you understand that, the word "church" used in the universal sense that you employ it, will not make any sense.

Thus who preserved and had the primary interpretative role of the Scriptures? The churches or assemblies, just as the Bible teaches they did, and that is sola acriptura.
DHK

 

Yes, and the church fathers fought against gnosticism using the Scriptures interpreted by the apostolic rule of faith. And, yes, this false teaching did make inroads and gain converts, but it didn't overwhelm the church and distort all of Christianity as you seem to imply.

Being closer in time, these early Christians were much more likely to know the real thing than a subset of the Reformers in the 16th century. Otherwise, we have the incredible scenario that the Church universally got it wrong on baptism and the eucharist, all misinterpreting the relevent Biblical passages regardless of geographical location and time until a few, Zwingli and his followers, got it right 1500 years after the fact. (Talk about a rift in the time/space fabric!). So according to this scenario, the Holy Spirit allowed the Church to wallow in error regarding these two doctrines until Zwingli (not Luther, not Calvin) saw the light. It's not just a case of "allowing prophecies to come true" regarding false prophets infiltrating the church; it's about the entire church falling into error in the exact same way right from the start until a particular man, guided by God, set them all straight (err..well..set some of them straight, since the majority of the world's Christians continued to believe in the real presence and baptismal regeneration). This sounds more like Mormonism than Christianity--you know, the entire Christian world going off track (and in the exact same way) right after the apostles died until God's annointed prophet would rediscover true Christianity centuries later. But inspite of all this, and inspite of themselves, the Holy Spirit did at the end of the 4th century guide these same universally misguided souls to recognize the right books (just not the right interpretation--that would have to wait another 1100 years) of the canon.

Regarding the eucharist, you seem to make a big deal about the idea of the bread and wine "supernaturally changing" into the Body and Blood being an alleged innovation simply because you cannot find that phrase in the Holy Writ. But the idea of "change" is obviously implied, assuming that the realistic language used by Christ and the apostles was to be taken at face value, or else everytime anyone ate bread of drank wine in whatever circumstance he'd be taking communion(!). I guess the authors of Scripure should have actually written the word "Trinity" to spare us all the confusion, sincing using your same line of reasoning, JWs and Oneness folks (etc) call the doctrine of the Trinity a heretical innovation. No the early believers believed in the real presence because by faith they agreed with Paul that the blessed cup is the communion of the blood of Christ and the broken bread is the communion of the body of Christ, thus agreeing with Christ that by faith His flesh was food indeed and His blood was drink indeed. They were neither cannibals nor proto-Zwinglians. Nor were they gnostics who thought that matter was evil and would therefore be a most unworthy means of communion with Christ.

But the solid written record includes documentation of what Christians believed, from the NT all the way up to the present. It's not a "vapor". The written historical record is what shows Rome to be the innovator in regards to the filioque and the growing pretensions of an increasingly monarchial papacy.

 

Amen.

 

But...but...but....isn't lone-ranger Christianity safer than trusting that some big, mean ol' bureaucracy has the right interpretation? Isn't it safer for me to wallow around in my own private errors than in the alleged errors of an allegedly corrupt organization? Huh...huh?

Seriously, Matt, I do agree with your post. (Just say "No!" to relativism.)

 

The RCC itself is "self-directed" by the Pope - himSelf.

 

Interesting that you should say that. From what I've read, there is actually a saying in Orthodoxy that "the Pope was the first Protestant".

 

Still you have the problem that chganges did occur, so the Holy Spirt had to have stopped inspiring at some point. Either that, or He was inspiring new truth all along. All this talk baout the Second Century; but neither the RCC or EOC today are identical to the second century.

 

there were small groups that went against the flow; and they were often powerless and silenced. For instance; you want to talk about disciples of John, Polycarp and his disciple Polycrates fought to preserve the Quartodeciman practice of communion, against the pagan, solar based "Easter Sunday" tradition being pushed by the bishops of Rome. It was the Easter tradition that prevailed in the "Church universal", and soon all traces of the older practice were completely gone; so right there, we see a difference between the "traditions handed down", and the energing catholicism. (This is a good example I have long forgotten to point out).

That's the key: much more likely. That is quite different from guararanteed. It is only by projection (and assumption) that you can jump from one to the other, and treat it as such.

Look at the example I gave above. A teaching was completely wiped out. Now lookf at issues like filioque, and everything else the Western Church does that you do not agree with. The only difference is that a larger segment of the Church opposed those changes by that time. So it was not wiped out; but continued to be held in tension; until the rift finally developed. If filioque and other admitted Western innovations had come up in the second century; they would have become "universal" and "believed by the entire church, the same way, at the same time" as well (remember; it was still spreading out. ), and the opposition would have been small, and easily quelched. You seem to underestimate the power of persuasion the Church was gaining over the world.

Well, there's definitely a point to that. Paul and John showed that the mystery of iniquity and spirit of antichrist were working right as they wrote. Yet the true Gospel would be preached, right before the end. As the RCC is bigger and more infuential than the EOC; you have to admit that "error" did prevail; but the debate once again, is how long the Holy Spirit guided the Church in doctrine. Did He continue only up to the second, or the fourth? Do you believe everything taught in the fourth century, then? That was when the empoeror recognized the Church, ans many of the councils and creeds were actually political in nature. This paved the way for everything the RCC later became; including the monoepiscopacy (pope as king). Was all of this secret NT apostolic oral tradition too? Clearly; there was great change by then.

But it wasn't as simple even, as that. The church had generally the right idea of the books of the NT. Some things some included, and somethings some excluded. The council was just the organized church of the time using the worldly power it gained to make an official pronouncement. This in itself was not BY God. But it too did not occur in a vacuum. These were already the books that the majority of the Church (not just the big power centers) had come to trust. So it is not a matter of "if I trust that God guided the power structure in canonization; why don't I trust that God guided them in doctrine and practice?" It's not about the organization and its councils. It's about the Church invisible, and God could still use it; even though the powere structure that was behind it was rapidly apostasizing.

Rather than "change" being "obiously inplied"; a spiritual metaphor is being mistaken, with some mystical meaning, that is really uncalled for, being read into it.

Actually; there is a theory, that "communion" WAS any meal that Christians ate together, and that would make sense. Obviously, Paul could not be talking about tiny cracker crumbs or wafers, and tiny vials of wine/grape juice when he speaks of people beling gluttons, and should eat in their own home to be filled, instead. Bread and Wine were mentionedl because he cited Christ's original example; which was a Passover Seder. So it's fellowshipping and eating together, where Christ is in the you/hr group spiritually (Mt.18:20), and you are partaking of Him. We speak of "eating worthily" meaning make sure you have repented/asked forgiveness of all your sins; but the context of "eating unworthily" was gluttony. In retrospect, it would have made me more careful about how many times I go back for "refreshments" in churches I have been in in the past.
But still, that is just a theory. But it gives you the idea of the spiritual (not mystical) nature of these ordinances.

No; the Creeds/councils could have been more careful with some of the language they used, and tried to remain truer to the anteNicene expression of it (Irenaeus, Hyppolytus, etc), which did not have the problematic language. Even the orthodox bishops were very leary of the Nicene creed; but signed it anyway, because the formulation was superior to Arianism and the others. Still; once again; the problem we see there was in the imperfections of man, not the scripture.

And the point was; they could still claim an unwritten oral tradition, perhaps held in secret by the then ruler in Rome. The written record, then, means nothing by itself.

Well, look at the Dark Ages. In fact; that is precisely what caused all the rationalism and the rest of the revolt against Church authority (including relativism) in the first place. Now; people just have to deny, and claim all was well; until the enlightenment rationalists and relativists came and wrecked everything. You haven't dealt with or proven that the organization wasn't corrupt. You're just mocking, now, but the history of it still stands, and proves it was not right. And the Dark Ages began before the split of the 11th century; so it was not just a problem of the RCC. No matter what you say; the church leaders are just as human as that "lone ranger", and make the scripture say what they want it to say just as much, but are for more persuasive and controlling; and therefore far more dangerous, as history has shown, and God has obviously not continued to guide them all the way down to the present. (and once again; God could inspire individuals as well. And the "faith community" is the invisible Church, which wile not agree ing on all things, has held to a core of essentials). Both churches are different from the second century church, so using the second century to try to prove they were right on baptism and communion, and therefore right in everything they say today just doesn't work. It is projection one thing to another, to another; like hopping over stones across a brook. It is pure projection; and I for one do not project the whole 16th century Church back to the NT. I believed they rediscovered one or two truths buried beneath centuries of an all powerful church hierarchy; but I do not claim they were the original true organization, or that ALL their doctrines were correct.
So just say no to relativism practiced by a large organization!

(And As I write this; the new Pope has just been installed! )