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Protestants and Sola Scriptura
Catholic Net ^ | George Sim Johnston

Posted on 05/03/2008 4:38:34 PM PDT by NYer

Scripture, our Evangelical friends tell us, is the inerrant Word of God. Quite right, the Catholic replies; but how do you know this to be true?


It's not an easy question for Protestants, because, having jettisoned Tradition and the Church, they have no objective authority for the claims they make for Scripture. There is no list of canonical books anywhere in the Bible, nor does any book (with the exception of St. John's Apocalypse) claim to be inspired. So, how does a "Bible Christian" know the Bible is the Word of God?


If he wants to avoid a train of thought that will lead him into the Catholic Church, he has just one way of responding: With circular arguments pointing to himself (or Luther or the Jimmy Swaggart Ministries or some other party not mentioned in the Bible) as an infallible authority telling him that it is so. Such arguments would have perplexed a first or second century Christian, most of whom never saw a Bible.


Christ founded a teaching Church. So far as we know, he himself never wrote a word (except on sand). Nor did he commission the Apostles to write anything. In due course, some Apostles (and non-Apostles) composed the twenty-seven books which comprise the New Testament. Most of these documents are ad hoc; they are addressed to specific problems that arose in the early Church, and none claim to present the whole of Christian revelation. It's doubtful that St. Paul even suspected that his short letter to Philemon begging pardon for a renegade slave would some day be read as Holy Scripture.


Who, then, decided that it was Scripture? The Catholic Church. And it took several centuries to do so. It was not until the Council of Carthage (397) and a subsequent decree by Pope Innocent I that Christendom had a fixed New Testament canon. Prior to that date, scores of spurious gospels and "apostolic" writings were floating around the Mediterranean basin: the Gospel of Thomas, the "Shepherd" of Hermas, St. Paul's Letter to the Laodiceans, and so forth. Moreover, some texts later judged to be inspired, such as the Letter to the Hebrews, were controverted. It was the Magisterium, guided by the Holy Spirit, which separated the wheat from the chaff.


But, according to Protestants, the Catholic Church was corrupt and idolatrous by the fourth century and so had lost whatever authority it originally had. On what basis, then, do they accept the canon of the New Testament? Luther and Calvin were both fuzzy on the subject. Luther dropped seven books from the Old Testament, the so-called Apocrypha in the Protestant Bible; his pretext for doing so was that orthodox Jews had done it at the synod of Jamnia around 100 A. D.; but that synod was explicitly anti-Christian, and so its decisions about Scripture make an odd benchmark for Christians.


Luther's real motive was to get rid of Second Maccabees, which teaches the doctrine of Purgatory. He also wanted to drop the Letter of James, which he called "an epistle of straw," because it flatly contradicts the idea of salvation by "faith alone" apart from good works. He was restrained by more cautious Reformers. Instead, he mistranslated numerous New Testament passages, most notoriously Romans 3:28, to buttress his polemical position.


The Protestant teaching that the Bible is the sole spiritual authority--sola scriptura --is nowhere to be found in the Bible. St. Paul wrote to Timothy that Scripture is "useful" (which is an understatemtn), but neither he nor anyone else in the early Church taught sola scriptura. And, in fact, nobody believed it until the Reformation. Newman called the idea that God would let fifteen hundred years pass before revealing that the bible was the sole teaching authority for Christians an "intolerable paradox."


Newman also wrote: "It is antecedently unreasonable to Bsuppose that a book so complex, so unsystematic, in parts so obscure, the outcome of so many minds, times, and places, should be given us from above without the safeguard of some authority; as if it could possibly, from the nature of the case, interpret itself...." And, indeed, once they had set aside the teaching authority of the Church, the Reformers began to argue about key Scriptural passages. Luther and Zwingli, for example, disagreed vehemently about what Christ meant by the words, "This is my Body."


St. Augustine, usually Luther's guide and mentor, ought to have the last word about sola scriptura: "But for the authority of the Church, I would not believe the Gospel."


TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; Ecumenism; Theology
KEYWORDS: 345; bible; chart; fog; gseyfried; luther; onwardthroughthefog; onwardthruthefog; scripture; seyfried; solascriptura; thefog
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To: Fichori
If Mary was a saint who died and went to heaven, then Johns descriptions of the saints in heaven would have been a description of Mary.

Mary is a separate category, just like the Elders who are similarly saints and DO make intercession.

1,681 posted on 05/07/2008 12:27:16 PM PDT by papertyger (That's what the little winky-face was for.)
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To: Petronski

didn’t read the post, did you? Your ignorance of the bond between the corrupt papacy and governments is telling. Ever study European history? Sheesh! [beating head on wall]

your grasping at straws. Your confidence in your political ‘church’ dwindeith. I know. I can hear it! ;P


1,682 posted on 05/07/2008 12:28:26 PM PDT by griffin
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To: Petronski

“Foxe was a fraud. When you cite him, you show your hand.”

Oh for Pete’s sake! Is that the best U got bro? How wacked is that?


1,683 posted on 05/07/2008 12:29:22 PM PDT by griffin
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To: Dr. Eckleburg
I "admitted" no such thing. As I've said four times now, I find nothing in the WCF to disagree with.

Then you do not disagree with its claim that the Pope is the antichrist. Is "not disagreeing" the same as "agreeing?" Do you not want to say?

1,684 posted on 05/07/2008 12:30:17 PM PDT by Petronski (When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth, voting for Hillary.)
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To: papertyger
"Mary is a separate category, just like the Elders who are similarly saints and DO make intercession."

Where is there a record of a dead saint making intersession?
1,685 posted on 05/07/2008 12:31:03 PM PDT by Fichori (FreeRepublic.com: Watch your step!)
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To: papertyger

I think you should pay grave attention to the character of the men you follow. It sure ain’t Christ......yet. ;)


1,686 posted on 05/07/2008 12:32:09 PM PDT by griffin
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To: griffin

You know very little about the Holy Roman Empire (which was none of those). You want to believe Foxe’s view of it and I leave you to your choice.

Just don’t try to pretend it is the reality in which the rest of us live.


1,687 posted on 05/07/2008 12:32:24 PM PDT by Petronski (When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth, voting for Hillary.)
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To: Dr. Eckleburg
I find nothing in the WCF to disagree with.

There is only agree and disagree, right?

Did Cauvin or Machen invent something new for you?

1,688 posted on 05/07/2008 12:34:10 PM PDT by Petronski (When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth, voting for Hillary.)
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To: Petronski

not much more I can say to you. Maybe some day you will come around.


1,689 posted on 05/07/2008 12:34:24 PM PDT by griffin
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To: papertyger
"Big deal, you were engaging in philosophical argumentation to “explain” the nature of God. My original assertions still stands, despite your caviling."

Another strawman.

There is a difference between philosophical argument and [empirical] science
1,690 posted on 05/07/2008 12:34:50 PM PDT by Fichori (FreeRepublic.com: Watch your step!)
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To: Fichori
Where is there a record of a dead saint making intersession?

...and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints. (Rev 5:8)

1,691 posted on 05/07/2008 12:36:16 PM PDT by papertyger (That's what the little winky-face was for.)
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To: griffin
Maybe some day you will come around.

And reject the Holy Eucharist?

Never.

1,692 posted on 05/07/2008 12:36:25 PM PDT by Petronski (When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth, voting for Hillary.)
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To: papertyger

How do you know the saints mentioned are dead?

According to Acts 9:32, not all saints are dead.

If the saints in question are dead.

Then those prayers went from the living saints, to the dead saints, to either God, or the elders who give them to God.

That would be a direct contradiction to John 14:6


1,693 posted on 05/07/2008 12:47:25 PM PDT by Fichori (FreeRepublic.com: Watch your step!)
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To: Fichori
There is a difference between philosophical argument and [empirical] science

You are simply incorrect. Philosophy was the beginning of all sciences. What you call empirical science was originally called natural philosophy. That is where the degree PhD comes from. It means Doctor of Philosophy.

Regardless, when I answered your question with simple science, you tried to claim it was inapplicable. When I answered your question with scripture, you want to jump to philosophical postulates.

Are you familiar with the verse in Luke where our Lord loses patience with those who are like children that will not dance when playing wedding and will not mourn when playing funeral?

1,694 posted on 05/07/2008 12:48:26 PM PDT by papertyger (That's what the little winky-face was for.)
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To: Fichori

Saints aren’t dead. Where would you get such an idea? It kind of misses the entire point of the Resurrection.


1,695 posted on 05/07/2008 12:49:30 PM PDT by SoothingDave
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To: griffin
I think you should pay grave attention to the character of the men you follow. It sure ain’t Christ......yet. ;)

I only take such advice from those who demonstrate intellectual integrity by supporting their accusations or withdrawing them.

1,696 posted on 05/07/2008 12:51:41 PM PDT by papertyger (That's what the little winky-face was for.)
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To: SoothingDave
"Saints aren’t dead. Where would you get such an idea? It kind of misses the entire point of the Resurrection."

I used the word dead in the same way Jesus used it in John 11:14
1,697 posted on 05/07/2008 12:55:21 PM PDT by Fichori (FreeRepublic.com: Watch your step!)
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To: Fichori
According to Acts 9:32, not all saints are dead.

32 And it came to pass, as Peter passed throughout all quarters, he came down also to the saints which dwelt at Lydda

?????

That would be a direct contradiction to John 14:6

I'm recalling your "direct contradiction" from Exodus, and I have to say I'm reminded of Ronald Reagan's quip about our friends that know so much that isn't so.

1,698 posted on 05/07/2008 12:59:05 PM PDT by papertyger (That's what the little winky-face was for.)
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To: Mad Dawg; wagglebee
In Christ, all the saints are higher than the angels. (I thought that was not argued about. Oh my.)

It isn't argued about. Christ, as the Head, is above all things:

1Pe 3:22 Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him.
(e-Sword: KJV)

As the Head is knit to the body, and as the body is attached to the Head, How can the body be in subjection to any other?

As the body of Christ, we are exalted with (and because of) Christ, who is above all powers and principalities, to include the angels.

Col 2:19 And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God.
Col 2:20 Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, [...]

Rom 8:38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Rom 8:39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

1Co 6:2 Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters?
1Co 6:3 Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life?

(e-Sword: KJV)


1,699 posted on 05/07/2008 1:03:33 PM PDT by roamer_1 (Globalism is just Socialism in a business suit.)
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To: griffin

My point is that you should’t try to force the emotions, and that you shouldn’t use them as a reliable indicator in determining the state of your soul.


1,700 posted on 05/07/2008 1:07:26 PM PDT by CautiouslyHopeful
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