Posted on 02/03/2012 6:31:03 AM PST by NYer
I am married to a Korean national. I mention this not just because it is cool (and it is cool) but I’ve learned quite a few things about my Faith from being close to someone of a very different culture.
Because of my wife’s nationality I know quite a few Koreans by association. They come from education backgrounds that make your humble scribe feel quite inferior, or at least I’d feel that way if they weren’t so humble about it. And one of the core components of this education is learning the English language.
To me they do indeed speak English well. Some can even speak without the hint of a Korean accent. I know firsthand how difficult this is given my own extremely difficult time learning Korean.
(What does this have to do with the Magisterium? Please bear with me).
However despite their best efforts I have come to notice that no matter how fluent they were certain ways they would speak seemed…well..awkward. For example, almost to a man, when one of my wife’s friends say something like they were sick yesterday they would say “My condition was not good.” This was true regardless of how well any of them spoke English. I pointed it out to my wife and she noted that it was more or less a direct translation of the Korean expression for having been sick in the past. Despite the quality of their English, they were still speaking Korean using English words.
Another time my wife was telling me about her college days and describing a particular student and his relationship to the students in her freshman group. There literally is no English word for the particular position that this person held. It is something of a cross between a mentor, a Resident Assistant, and a full blown teacher. The attempt of my wife to explain this concept actually took a bit of time, and my above description is my best attempt to explain this position.
What I’m trying to say is that one’s culture has a powerful effect on one’s exposure to concepts as well as how one is going to express themselves. The ability to communicate with one another is heavily dependent on the concepts being discussed and the modes of expression that the communicants share. The greater the disparity in either, the more communication it takes to attempt to bridge the gap.
At one point this started me thinking about the Bible. The books are written a long time ago by a culture with wildly different concepts and modes of expression than we have in modern English. And the New Testament was a translation of one culture into another, from the Jewish culture and language (Aramaic) to the Common Greek. Not only are these cultures different from ours (the Jewish and the Greek) but both cultures have grown and developed over time.
Just to give one example is the notion of “brother” in Jewish culture. The original Aramaic that Jesus and His followers spoke had no concept of “cousin.” To describe the relationship of one cousin to another they would say something like, “He is the son of my father’s brother.” Given how wordy this is they would simplify it to “he is my brother.”
Now someone might object to this by pointing out that the Common Greek had a word for cousin and if the authors wanted to say “cousin” they would have. But to me this doesn’t fly for two reasons. First, that knowledge of a language does not bestow the modes of expression the language uses. As in my first example, the Korean expressing that they were sick still use the Korean wording of the concept rendered into English. Second, given that Jesus and his people used Aramaic to communicate, it is actually more accurate to have a word for word translation, complete with ambiguity, rather than to impose a meaning on the words by trying to translate the wording into something more friendly to the new language.
These things led me to realize that if the Body of Christ has to go at Faith with a Bible Alone approach we are doomed. The time, culture and language separations are a huge obstacle to getting at the actual meaning of the texts, with all the nuance and subtlety that comes with theological understanding and the development of those concepts. This is readily apparent with our Protestant brethren, who continue to split into numerous sects and sects within sects.
The Bible is a product of the times and cultures that produced it. Despite the fact that it is the inerrant Word of God it still uses human culture and language to communicate to us. And because of the limits of both human language and cultural concepts, the existence of the Magisterium and Sacred Tradition simply make sense.
Our Lord provided us with an authoritative body that can express the Truths of Revelation over time and cultures without error. A body that has the authority to interpret the Sacred Texts and present them to all cultures and times. A body that lives and breathes with the cultures in time but stands above them. That such a body, the Magisterim, exists is not only to my mind beneficial, but necessary for preserving the Word of God and revealing the Word to us using the concepts and modes of communication we use.
My exposure to a foreign culture as different as the Korean one only illustrates the need for the Sacred Tradition, and the need for the authority of the Magisterium to guarantee the transmission of that Tradition. There is more to the Truth of the Word than our cultures and languages can transmit. The Magisterium exists to teach us in the ways we communicate today, and will exist to teach the cultures of the future. Through the Magisterium we overcome the Tower of Babel now and in the future.
That is not, and never was, my claim!
My statement is you must be protected from error to claim someone else's interpretation IS in error.
Why is it so hard for you to get the fact you can't say someone else is wrong without saying you yourself are right?
That is not, and never was, my claim! My statement is you must be protected from error to claim someone else's interpretation IS in error.
Why is it so hard for you to get the fact you can't say someone else is wrong without saying you yourself are right?
I affirm that, but why can't you see that your statement was not only that the person is claiming inerrancy, but which you equated with what Rome engages in, which is claiming they are right based upon her claim of assured infallibility?
Such a person commits the same act they criticize the Catholic Church for, but simply isn't smart enough to recognize that fact.
We do not claim Rome is in error simply because saying someone else is wrong means saying they are right(!), but because she presumes a special charism of infallibility which precludes that she can be wrong, regardless of the evidence, esp from the assuredly infallible authority of Scripture.
The Scriptures require believers to make moral reprove error, (Eph. 4:11) but it is the bases for it that is the issue.
And again, it is accepted that saying someone is wrong means saying you are right, but it is not the same thing as claiming inerrancy after the manner of Rome. However, if you want to imagine we simply object to the former and not the latter, and not deal with that, then no further exchange seems unnecessary.
This much is true!
Let me clarify this early morning "double exposure:"
The Scriptures require believers to make moral reprove error, (Eph. 4:11) but it is the bases for it that is the issue.
Corrected and rephrased, the Scriptures require believers to make moral judgments and reprove error, (Eph. 4:11) but it is the basis for such that remains the issue.
It is also understood that Rome does not claim to define doctrine irregardless regardless of evidence, but that her claim to infallibility precludes that evidence could prove her wrong, and that assurance of the infallibility of her decrees does not rest upon the weight of scriptural warrant.
Simple. The Church has a scriptural mandate that the individual does not. It's no more complicated than that.
Wow, you really need to take a deep breath before you write.
Show your last two posts to anyone you know, and I defy them to make sense of whatever it is you’re trying to get across.
You mean,
“the Scriptures require believers to make moral judgments and reprove error, (Eph. 4:11) but it is the basis for such that remains the issue.”
It is also understood that Rome does not claim to define doctrine irregardless [edit] of evidence, but that her claim to infallibility precludes that evidence could prove her wrong, and that assurance of the infallibility of her decrees does not rest upon the weight of scriptural warrant.
“And again, it is accepted that saying someone is wrong means saying you are right, but it is not the same thing as claiming inerrancy after the manner of Rome. However, if you want to imagine we simply object to the former and not the latter, and not deal with that, then no further exchange seems unnecessary.”
Sorry if it is not yet understandable to you now.
The issue goes deeper, as the mandate to discern and teach truth is one thing, and the basis upon which it does so is another.
And under the premise that the church is the supreme authority you have different churches competing with each other for the title of the one true church, based on the premise of assured infallibility. And which (again) in the case of Rome effectively rests upon her own deceleration to be so, infallibly claiming she is infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined criteria, and which does not necessarily render the reasoning and arguments behind them to infallible.
And which is not what the Scriptural mandate to discern and teach truth presumes, but which is established upon Scripture being supreme and providing the warrant and attestation by which truth claims are established.
Dude, your prose is just about impenetrable. If there is anything making “further exchange unnecessary: that’s it.
Seriously... “not yet understandable to you now?”
Is that suppose to mean “misunderstood?”
Perhaps it would be easier going if you stopped trying to continually drag Rome into the discussion. I used it as a simple contrast while making a point about fallacious logic, but you insist on making it the topic.
I’d really like to respond to this hash, but I just can’t figure out what you’re trying to say....
No, your statement was in response to and in the context of Rome versus SS types, in which you equated MM making an assertion to that of what we criticize Rome for doing, as if she was claiming inerrancy in like manner, and as if we think Rome is wrong simply for making truth claims (many of which we agree with) rather than her premise of assured infallibility being the problem;
In which whatever statements the universal and ordinary magisterium speaks on faith and morals to all the church are assuredly infallible, due to a special charism given to them in making such, and thus she cannot possibly be wrong.
In contrast, this claim to assured infallibility cannot be the basis for our statements, as such depend upon Scriptural warrant for their establishment or correction, Scripture alone being assuredly infallible.
And thus we seek to persuade souls by manifestation of the truth, with Scripture being the assured word of God, and by such souls can realize Scriptural assurance - not that we are protected by any possibility error as per the criteria of Rome.
And if assurance of truth can only be had by assent to an magisterial office with assured infallibility, then no one could have been sure of anything before Rome, as Scripture know of no such office of men. Nor did Christ have the sanction of those who sat i the seat of Moses, but His authority was established upon Scriptural warrant with the manner of attestation it provides for.
That is all.
Then i guess that's enough.
If God was, according to your way of thinking, unable to clearly and adequately express Himself in the Bible, what makes you think He is capable of doing so through the Magesterium?
OUCH!!!!!!!!!
Like Pope Francis?
Whoa! We just went for a journey in the way-back machine!
I just noticed the date myself.
However, the point is well made.
Yes it is.
If God didn’t mean what He was saying
Why didn’t He say what He meant!
So I’m supposed to trust a corrupt, immoral Catholic clergy to clarify for me what God meant when He breathed out Scripture?
I don’t think so.
They don’t follow God’s word themselves. They have no business telling other people how to live it.
Look a that list Hellooo!!!!
Hello to old friends!!!
All you hardened soldiers for the Lord Jesus!
Old Salts!
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I’m grateful for each puncture to my ego you friends have given me.
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Anybody feeling that the Lord’s appearance to take his Bride is right around the corner???
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I’m feeling like I need to read the words of our Good Master on my knees and examine my self in-light of what I find.
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Do you remember when they were transfigured on the mount? With serious past and future men of God present, (the “Old” and the “New” guys), God breaks the cloud, puts one spotlight on Jesus, and says “Listen to Him.”
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The OT & NT are the two Witnesses. The Gospels are the Word.
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I ramble...
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My dearest to you all!!!
Fire at will.
Ah yes, the magicsteeringthem ... satan loves the vehicle. I wonder how many / what percentage are pedophiles and or homosexual devaints sitting on the magicsteeringthem?
Really?
I say if we have to some other dudes also far removed from the original Greek and Hebrew to explain it for me, then I am probably DOOMED.
I suspect that the oft discussed "Call no man father" verse should REALLY be translated: Call no man cousin.
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