Posted on 11/06/2011 4:29:37 AM PST by markomalley
|
That this rule of faith has come down to us from the beginning of the gospel, even before any of the older heretics, much more before Praxeas, a pretender of yesterday, will be apparent both from the lateness of date which marks all heresies, and also from the absolutely novel character of our new-fangled Praxeas. In this principle also we must henceforth find a presumption of equal force against all heresies whatsoever—that whatever is first is true, whereas that is spurious which is later in date.Below is a list of the year of the earliest (of which I am aware) extant extra-biblical witness of various Christian doctrines.
(A.D. 33 - death and resurrection of Christ)
A.D. 90 - the Lord's Supper as a sacrifice
(A.D. 95 - death of the last apostle, John)
A.D. 95 - apostolic succession
A.D. 110 - real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist
A.D. 150 - baptismal regeneration and the necessity of baptism for salvation
A.D. 150 - basic structure of the Mass as Christian worship
A.D. 155 - veneration of saints and their relics
A.D. 160 - Mary as the New Eve
A.D. 170 - use of the word 'Trinity'
A.D. 180 - primacy of the bishop of Rome
A.D. 200 - 'Trinity', 'Person', 'Substance' formula
A.D. 367 - today's 27 book New Testament canon
(A.D. 1500s - Protestant Reformation)
(Note: Those that are (underlined) are relevant events to help put the other dates in perspective. Those doctrines in bold are accepted by evangelicals and Catholics and are also listed to help put the other dates in perspective. Those doctrines not bolded are accepted by Catholics and are rejected by most evangelicals as corruptions of the faith. All dates listed are of course approximate. The quotes showing the witness to these doctrines in those years are at the end of this post.)
I have seven comments:
1) Notice the large number of doctrines/practices that are rejected by most evangelicals as Roman Catholic corruptions of the faith that are witnessed to prior to explicit development of the doctrine of the Trinity or even the first extant witness to the 27 book New Testament canon. In other words, if all of those beliefs which most evangelicals tend to view as sure markers of the obviously perverted corruption of the Catholic Church were already there, then the same Church that settled the New Testament canon and fought the Trinitarian and Christological fights of the 4th century was already well immersed in corruption, superstition, and heresy.
2) Remember that evangelicals claim that all of those Catholic beliefs listed above - the Lord's Supper as sacrifice, apostolic succession, veneration of saints and their relics, etc - were all invented and did not come from the apostles, even though the Christians immediately following the apostles, including some who knew the apostles personally, did think that those doctrines came from the apostles.
 |
Alexandria, who was ban- ished five times by the gov't for preaching the teachings of the Council of Nicea regarding the Trinity |
If the above is unclear:"But every Lord's day gather yourselves together, and break bread, and give thanksgiving after having confessed your transgressions, that your sacrifice may be pure. But let no one that is at variance with his fellow come together with you, until they be reconciled, that your sacrifice may not be profaned. For this is that which was spoken by the Lord: In every place and time offer to me a pure sacrifice; for I am a great King, says the Lord, and my name is wonderful among the nations. [Malachi 1.11,14]"
Offering the Sacrifice of the Mass
"He then speaks of those Gentiles, namely us, who in every place offer sacrifices to Him, i.e., the bread of the Eucharist, and also the cup of the Eucharist"A.D. 95
"The apostles have preached the gospel to us from the Lord Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ [has done so] from God. Christ therefore was sent forth by God, and the apostles by Christ. Both these appointments, then, were made in an orderly way, according to the will of God. Having therefore received their orders, and being fully assured by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and established in the word of God, with full assurance of the Holy Ghost, they went forth proclaiming that the kingdom of God was at hand. And thus preaching through countries and cities, they appointed the first fruits [of their labours], having first proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops and deacons of those who should afterwards believe. [...] Our apostles also knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife on account of the office of the episcopate. For this reason, therefore, inasmuch as they had obtained a perfect fore-knowledge of this, they appointed those [ministers] already mentioned, and afterwards gave instructions, that when these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed them in their ministry."
A.D. 110"Let no man deceive himself. ...[I]f they believe not in the blood of Christ, shall, in consequence, incur condemnation. [...] But consider those who are of a different opinion with respect to the grace of Christ which has come unto us, how opposed they are to the will of God. [...] They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again. Those, therefore, who speak against this gift of God, incur death in the midst of their disputes."If the above isn't clear enough:
"And this food is called among us the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh."A.D. 150
"Then they are brought by us where there is water, and are regenerated in the same manner in which we were ourselves regenerated. For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water. For Christ also said, Unless you be born again, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. [John 3.3]"
"And this food is called among us the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined."If the necessity of baptism is not clear enough in the above quotes:
"...the prescript is laid down that without baptism, salvation is attainable by none (chiefly on the ground of that declaration of the Lord, who says, Unless one be born of water, he has not life [John 3.5])"A.D. 150
"[O]n the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons."A.D. 155
 |
"[After Bishop Polycarp was martyed in a Roman stadium] But when the adversary of the race of the righteous, the envious, malicious, and wicked one, perceived the impressive nature of his martyrdom, and [considered] the blameless life he had led from the beginning, and how he was now crowned with the wreath of immortality, having beyond dispute received his reward, he did his utmost that not the least memorial of him should be taken away by us, although many desired to do this, and to become possessors of his holy flesh. For this end he suggested it to Nicetes, the father of Herod and brother of Alce, to go and entreat the governor not to give up his body to be buried, lest, said he, forsaking Him that was crucified, they begin to worship this one. This he said...being ignorant of this, that it is neither possible for us ever to forsake Christ, who suffered for the salvation of such as shall be saved throughout the whole world (the blameless one for sinners ), nor to worship any other. For Him indeed, as being the Son of God, we adore; but the martyrs, as disciples and followers of the Lord, we worthily love on account of their extraordinary affection towards their own King and Master, of whom may we also be made companions and fellow disciples!"A.D. 160
"[Jesus] became man by the Virgin, in order that the disobedience which proceeded from the serpent might receive its destruction in the same manner in which it derived its origin. For Eve, who was a virgin and undefiled, having conceived the word of the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy, when the angel Gabriel announced the good tidings to her that the Spirit of the Lord would come upon her, and the power of the Highest would overshadow her: wherefore also the Holy Thing begotten of her is the Son of God; and she replied, 'Be it unto me according to your word.'"A.D 170
"In like manner also the three days which were before the luminaries, are types of the Trinity, of God, and His Word, and His wisdom. And the fourth is the type of man, who needs light, that so there may be God, the Word, wisdom, man."
 |
“But since it would be too long to enumerate in such a volume as this the successions of all the churches, we shall confound all those who, in whatever manner, whether through self-satisfaction or vainglory, or through blindness and wicked opinion, assemble other than where it is proper, by pointing out here the successions of the bishops of the greatest and most ancient church known to all, founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul—that church which has the tradition and the faith with which comes down to us after having been announced to men by the apostles. For with this Church, because of its superior origin, all churches must agree, that is, all the faithful in the whole world. And it is in her that the faithful everywhere have maintained the apostolic tradition.”A.D. 200
"...especially in the case of this heresy, which supposes itself to possess the pure truth, in thinking that one cannot believe in One Only God in any other way than by saying that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are the very selfsame Person. As if in this way also one were not All, in that All are of One, by unity (that is) of substance; while the mystery of the dispensation is still guarded, which distributes the Unity into a Trinity, placing in their order the three Persons— the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost: three, however, not in condition, but in degree; not in substance, but in form; not in power, but in aspect; yet of one substance, and of one condition, and of one power, inasmuch as He is one God, from whom these degrees and forms and aspects are reckoned, under the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. How they are susceptible of number without division, will be shown as our treatise proceeds."A.D. 367
St Athanasius, Easter Letter of 367, 5:
"Again it is not tedious to speak of the [books] of the New Testament. These are, the four Gospels, according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Afterwards, the Acts of the Apostles and Epistles (called Catholic), seven, viz. of James, one; of Peter, two; of John, three; after these, one of Jude. In addition, there are fourteen Epistles of Paul, written in this order. The first, to the Romans; then two to the Corinthians; after these, to the Galatians; next, to the Ephesians; then to the Philippians; then to the Colossians; after these, two to the Thessalonians, and that to the Hebrews; and again, two to Timothy; one to Titus; and lastly, that to Philemon. And besides, the Revelation of John."*Except perhaps with the primacy of the bishop of Rome, but the early dissent was small compared to the confusion/dissent regarding the Trinity and the New Testament canon. Major dissent regarding the role of the bishop of Rome came much later.
Wasn’t the Book of Revelation considered a “deuterocanonical” work at one time?
“Mormons, Baptists and others teach the Church went “apostate” in the 2nd century and needed to be “restored”, they only differ whether the “restoration” took place in the 16th or 19th century.”
Actually, I’ve said that large parts of the visible church went astray, particularly in theology, but that God still saved those who responded to Him.
It was called the “Reformation”, not the “Restoration”. By Baptists and by Protestants.
“they didn’t need to publish authoritative lists, they published the Bible.”
Well, not in the vernacular, and not with the intent for commoners to read it. As you well know, the Catholic Church took a pretty strong stance AGAINST commoners reading scripture, from about 1200-1800 AD.
“the 73 books in it were Scripture, the books not in it weren’t Scripture.”
Nope. Not according to the Roman Catholic Church. That is why the term “deuterocanonicals” needed to be invented in 1566. The Old Vulgate had 3 books that didn’t make the cut in the Council of Trent - probably just a mistake on the part of the infallible council - so the revised Vulgate was published with those 3 separate, and they later were dropped.
But what to call the Apocrypha minus those 3? Thus “deuterocanonicals” - coined in 1566.
“who has the authority to say infallibly this is the correct cannon of Scripture?”
God. And each individual will answer for listening, or not.
“Wasn’t the Book of Revelation considered a “deuterocanonical” work at one time?”
Sort of. It was on the lists made around 400 AD in Africa, but not all congregations accepted it.
“While the ideas of a canon became more clear, only the core described previously was certain. Revelation in particular was attacked by many because Montanism had made apocalyptic material suspect. Gaius of Rome, an early third century churchman, attacked the inclusion of the Gospel of St. John, Hebrews, and Revelation on anti-Montanist grounds (he ascribed St. John’s Gospel and Revelation to Cerinthus, a Gnostic heretic who was a contemporary of St. John).(40) In general, however, apocalyptic material, while treated with caution, was not considered as suspect in the West as in the East. The Shepherd was dropped from the Western canon; the Revelation of Peter and the Revelation of John were both challenged. However, in the East (the Greek speaking parts of the world and Egypt), there was nearly universal refusal to allow apocalyptic writings into the canon until Western influence began to sway the Eastern Christians in the fourth century. Moreover, Hebrews was rejected in the West because it was used by the Montanists to justify their harsh penetential system and because the West was not certain of its authorship. Hebrews was not accepted in the West until the fourth century under the influence of St. Athanasius.”
“The canon of the Syriac-speaking churches in the third century included the Diatessaron and the fourteen Pauline epistles. In the early fifth century, the Peshitta became the official text of Syriac-speaking churches. It replaced the Diatessaron with the four gospels. It contained the 22 books of our New Testament other than II Peter, II John, III John, Jude, and Revelation. (The Peshitta is traditionally held to be the work of Rabulla, bishop of Edessa from 412-435. However, it probably built on work of the previous century.) The Nestorian church still uses this 22 book canon. In 508, the Jacobite branch of the Syriac church came to accept the standard 27 book canon.”
“Thus, we see that producing the final form of the New Testament canon took a considerable period of time. It took still longer to produce near universal agreement. However, to this day, there exist ancient churches which have either never accepted certain books or which accept more than 27 books. The canon in its present form was not a self-evident fact, but the result of a prolonged struggle-we reap the fruits of other men’s labors.”
http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/ntcanon_emergence.aspx
So God told you personally that the Book of Revelation is Scripture?
If so, I’m impressed.
Has God sent me a list, possibly by email? No.
Does the Holy Spirit speak to me when I read Revelations? Not a lot, really, but enough for me to be content with it on the list.
Does the Holy Spirit speak to me as I read the Shepherd of Hermas, or the Epistle of Barnabas? Nope - other than to tell me it is NOT the word of God.
In like manner, when I read the Apocrypha, it is empty of God’s Spirit.
Add in that the vast majority of the christian church has accepted most of the NT almost as soon as it was penned, and all of the OT, and I am comfortable facing God’s judgement in the matter - for all of us will be judged as individuals.
Please also remember that a great many Catholic scholars said all along that the Apocrypha was good for reading, but not for doctrine, and I’ll have a lot of company in rejecting the Apocrypha as authoritative.
And to the best of my knowledge, there are only a couple verses in the entire Apocrypha used for doctrine by Roman Catholics.
“its antiquity does not guarantee that it is truly apostolic or teaches the correct doctrine”
Yes! Here’s an important consideration to recognize. It’s like the supposed “oldest manuscripts” of the Bible; That’s a false assumption, because the manuscripts that were written on parchment outlasted the earliest ones, which were written on papyrus or paper. So the earliest ones are the later ones.
I might add that scripture cites genuine apocryphal writings. Namely the Book of Enoch and the Assumption of Moses in the book of Jude.
Perhaps Jude is apocryphal too.
I might add that scripture cites genuine apocryphal writings. Namely the Book of Enoch and the Assumption of Moses in the book of Jude.
Perhaps Jude is apocryphal too.
Paul also cited a Cretan prophet in Titus, IIRC, but he did not do so for authority.
“It is written” appears many times in the New Testament, but never with the Apocrypha.
“But... surely you realize that this is a mere appeal to raw emotion and personal taste?”
Actually, it is an appeal to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. “26But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.”
Neither Philemon nor Revelations is my favorite book of the Bible, but I’ve never felt the Holy Spirit telling me they were not God’s word.
Remember, the canon was settled, not by a bunch of theologians making a list, but by congregations agreeing that X was scripture, and Y was not.
Do you consider the Book of Enoch to be scripture?
A brief but very insightful presentation.
And to be clear: these dates are the dates of our earliest extant writings containing those doctrines. They are not new doctrines from those dates, but are rather understood as authentic doctrines by the authors who wrote at those dates, among the very scarce writings.
1 - I’m not interested in proving that scripture is scripture. You decide to accept it or not. You will be judged by God, not by me, so you must follow your conscience.
2 - If you prefer, “The Pope said so”, that is also your choice. I’m underwhelmed by it.
3 - Did anyone wait to use the Gospels, or Paul’s writing, as scripture until 400 AD, when the local church councils were held?
Nope. They were being used and accepted as scripture and authoritative before ANY church council declared anything. Thus, I conclude that it was a bottom-up process. For it to have been a top-down process, folks would have needed to wait until 400 AD at least - and arguably until the 1500s.
the Catholics are the originals.
Introduction: Heresy [The Great Heresies]
The Great Heresies
John Calvin’s Worst Heresy: That Christ Suffered in Hell
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Succumbs to Heresy
The Bishop Discovers Heresy?
From Orthodox to Heresy: The Secularizing of Catholic Universities
Progressivism/Liberalism is Heresy [Excellent read & reference]
Is heresy better than schism? [Ecumenical]
Modernism: The Modernist Heresy
THE GREAT HERESIES-THE MODERN PHASE
The Protestant Heresy
The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene
Americanism, Then and Now: Our Pet Heresy (encyclical of Pope Leo XIII)
Heresies then and now: ancient Christian heresies practiced in modern times
The Plain Truth About The Baptist Bride Heresy
Balthasar, Hell, and Heresy: An Exchange (is it compatable with the Catholic faith?)
Know Your Heresies
The Rev. John Piper: an interesting look at "heresy vs. schism"
Pietism as an Ecclesiological Heresy
Heresy
Arian Heresy Still Tempts, Says Cardinal Bertone (Mentions Pelagianism As Well)
Catholic Discussion] Church group stays faithful (to heresy!)
An overview of modern anti-Trinitarian heresies
Where heresy and dissent abound [Minnesota]
Gnostic Gospels - the heresy entitled "Gnosticism."
Christian mavericks find affirmation in ancient heresies
The So-Called ‘Gospel’ of Judas: Unmasking an Ancient Heresy
Benedict XVI Heresies and Errors
Donatism (Know your heresies)
The Heresy of Mohammed (Chapter 4, The Great Heresies)
Father & Son Catholic Writers Tag-Team Old & New Heresies
Actually, I’ve said that large parts of the visible church went astray, particularly in theology, but that God still saved those who responded to Him.
care to us what part of the “visible church” didn’t go astray?
“who has the authority to say infallibly this is the correct cannon of Scripture?”
you answered “God”. please tell me where God provides a table of contents for the canon or does God communicate to you directly the canon?
No. But Jude 1:14-15 quotes from it.
“And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these [men], saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”
Then using your reasoning for what is or is not canonical, shouldn’t you add the Book of Enoch to your canon?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
