Posted on 04/03/2013 3:43:07 PM PDT by NYer
Q: Okay, so what is the Christian account of how revelation occurred?
As Elmer Fudd might say, “Vewy, vewy swowly.” Divine revelation didn’t happen in a blinding flash—such as God dropping the Summa Theologiae on top of a mountain and waiting for people to invent the Latin language so they could read it. (Though He could have given them magical spectacles that would translate it for them….) It seems that God preferred to slowly unfold His personality and His will for us through the course of tangled, messy human history. We might wonder why, and call up the divine customer service line to ask why in heck human nature arrived in the mail without the instructions. I don’t pretend to know what He was thinking here, but I find it aesthetically fitting that our knowledge of God evolved in much the way that animal species did, over a long time and by fits and starts, with sudden leaps whenever God saw fit, until finally the world was ready to receive the final product: in creation, man, in revelation, the Son of Man. God seems to prefer planting seeds to winding up robots.
So we start with traces of a primitive monotheism among some scattered peoples of the world—which might have been long-faded memories of what Adam told his children about the whole “apple incident,” combined with crude deductions that boil down to “Nothing comes from nothing.” But mankind pretty much wandered around with no more than that for quite some time, and this was when he employed the inductive method to discover the hemorrhoid god.
The first incident in Jewish-Christian scriptures that suggests God revealed Himself to us after that is the rather discouraging narrative of Noah. According to the story, the human race went so wrong so fast that God decided to backspace over most of it, leaving only a single righteous family, trapped on a stinky boat with way too many pets. When they landed, they had no more idea of what to do with themselves than the cast of Gilligan’s Island, so God gave them instructions: We call this the Covenant of Noah. The Jews believe that these are the only commandments God gave to the Gentiles—7 of them, instead of 613—and that the rest of us can please God just by keeping them. That’s the reason that Jews don’t generally try to make converts. (Who are we to run around making things harder for people? Feh!) The Jewish Talmud enumerates the 7 laws of Noah as follows:
Most of this sounds fairly obvious and commonsensical—though we might wonder why it was necessary to tell people to stop pulling off pieces of live animals and eating them. They must have gotten into some pretty bad habits while they were still stuck on that ark.
Q: That ark must have been the size of Alabama…
I know, I know.
Q. …to fit all those elephants, hippos, rhinos, tree sloths, polar bears, gorillas, lions and moose…
Okay, smart guy.
Q. …not to mention breeding pairs of more than 1,000,000 species of insects. Sure they’re mostly small, but those creepy-crawlies add up.
Spoken like a true-believing member of Campus Crusade for Cthulu, complete with a bad case of acne and involuntary celibacy. Maybe you should focus on Onan instead of Noah.
Look, there’s a reason why Catholics don’t read the bible in an exclusively literal sense, and haven’t since the time of Origen (+253). The Church looks at the books of scripture according to the genres in which they were written (history, allegory, wisdom, prophecy, and so on). And this story, clearly, was intended as allegory—which means that on top of some historical content (and there’s flotsam from flood-narratives in the basement of most ancient cultures) the writer piled up details to make a point. Unlike liberal Protestants, we don’t use this principle to explain away Jesus’ miracles and the moral law. Nor are we fundamentalists who take everything in the bible literally—except for “This is my body,” (Luke 22: 19) “Thou art Peter,” (Matthew 16: 18) and “No, your pastor can’t get divorced.” (Cleopatra 7: 14) The Church responded to biblical criticism with appropriate skepticism at first, and accepted the useful parts (like reading original languages and looking for ancient manuscripts), without throwing out the traditional mode of reading the bible in light of how the Church Fathers traditionally understood it.
Q. Why should the Church be the interpreter of the bible?
In the case of the New Testament, the Church had transcribed the books; shouldn’t we own the copyright to our own memoirs? When the list of accepted gospels and epistles was drawn up, there were more surplus candidates milling around than in downtown Manchester, New Hampshire, before a primary—some of them inspirational but probably inauthentic, like the Protoevangelium that tells the story of Mary’s childhood; others creepily gnostic, like the “Gospel of Thomas,” which has Jesus using His “superpowers” to wreak revenge on His schoolmates. (That gospel is always popular, since it shows Jesus doing exactly what each of us would really do in His place.) The decision on which books were divinely inspired was based largely on the evidence of the liturgy: which books had been used in churches for services in the most places for the longest. As I like to tell Jehovah’s Witnesses who come to my door: that bible you’re waving at me was codified by a council of Catholic bishops who prayed to Mary and the saints, baptized infants, and venerated the Eucharist. So you could say that as the original, earthly author and editor, the Church has a better claim of knowing how to read it than the reporters at National Geographic—who every Christmas or Easter discover some new and tantalizing scrap of papyrus containing gnostic sex magic tips or Judas’ “To-do” list.
In the case of the Old Testament, the Church draws heavily on how Jews traditionally read their own scriptures—but with one important and obvious difference. We are the descendants of the faction of Jews who accepted Christ as the Messiah and evangelized the gentiles, all the while considering themselves the “faithful remnant” who’d remained true to the faith of Abraham. So we see throughout the Old Testament foreshadowings of Christ, for instance in Abraham’s sacrifice, and Isaiah’s references to the “suffering servant.” The Jews who were skeptical of Jesus believed that they were heroically resisting a blasphemous false prophet who’d tempted them to idolatry. As the Church spread and gained political clout, and Christians began to shamefully mistreat the people from whom they’d gotten monotheism in the first place, there surely was genuine heroism entailed in standing firm. I often wonder how many Jews would be drawn to Jesus if they could separate Him from the sins committed against their great-grandparents in His name….
The version of the Old Testament that Catholics and Orthodox use is different from what Jews use today. Our version, based on the Septuagint translation into Greek, is somewhat longer, and includes some later documents that Jews accepted right up to the time Saint Paul converted—books that illustrate a lot of the mature developments in Judaism which led up to the coming of Christ. The very fact that Christian apostles were using these books may have led the rabbis to eventually reject them. (Since the biblical references to Purgatory can be found in these books, Martin Luther and the Anglicans also excluded them.) Ironically, the Book of Maccabees exists in Catholic bibles but not Jewish ones, and right up until Vatican II we had a Feast of the Maccabees—which means that you could call Chanukah a Catholic holiday. But don’t tell the judges in New York City, or they’ll pull all the menorahs out of the schools.
The fact that every Published Vulgate from 405 onwards had this list of books? Or did that just happen at random?
I would suggest not using wikipedia as a source.
“Doctrines are created on the basis of popularity?”
Sure they are, and if you think that they aren’t, then I think you maybe need to go back and review the history a bit more.
Mine? I haven’t translated or published any Bible, so your comment makes little sense.
If you paid much attention, you’d see that’s already been answered a few times on this thread.
The difference in what Doctrine is and what you think it is is of galactic proportions and, as such is not bridgeable by reason
Bye
Neither "JustforCatholics.org" and the New Catholic Encyclopedia are inerrant, nor necessarily scholastically authoritative. I do not know a single theology or Church history that would accept them as a valid source.
In reality, St. Jerome did state that he knew of no Jews who considered the Deuterocanonical books as a part of Jewish canon or Scripture, but St. Jerome was not asked to second guess or validate the decisions of the Council of Rome or the directive of his Pope to translate the listed books. He stated numerous times in his later writings that he did consider them to be Scripture.
Peace be with you
You wrote:
“I find your ferocity about denying the inspiration of Scripture puzzling.”
I find it puzzling that you would make up an outright falsehood saying I deny the inspiration of scripture. I have never, EVER, done any such thing.
“I find it puzzling that you would make up an outright falsehood saying I deny the inspiration of scripture. I have never, EVER, done any such thing.”
That’s how the attitude of your post reads. I am glad to hear that I was wrong.
“What Protestants do is divorce teh bible from the magisterium, arguing that Scripture is inspired - but the Magisterium has no authority. This approach has some severe difficulties. “
The difficulty I see with the RC way is that men are fallen.
“All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) “There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God.” (Romans 3: 10-11)
So depend upon a Magisterium or any other group of men to decide what is Scripture and what is not, or what the Scripture particularly says; particularly when they add in things that are absolutely not there; and especially when they add in things that really are forbidden - this is a problem.
Scripture, being God’s very word, is infallible. Men, being fallen, are the definition of fallible. Thus I don’t think it is right to depend upon the Magisterium over the authority of the Bible.
Some believe Protestants reject all church authority. Some indeed may. However, I certainly don’t. I do believe the Bible ordains legitimate authority, to exercise church discipline and dispense sacraments and have authority within the church. We in our church agree to submit to them, but with the caveat - within the bonds of Scripture.
Is this a good summation? (Serious) Protestants believe that the Bible prescribes what church authority there is. (Serious) Roman Catholics believe that church authority prescribes what the Bible is.
So answer his simple question. How do you know that 1 Timothy (for example) is inspired scripture?
You’ve been wrong all along. And you still can’t answer my questions.
Indeed consciences must be properly formed to be reliable, and that should be a given, otherwise it would have even less weight, for rather than making conscience the supreme objective guide (as some contort Ratzinger as saying), i was careful to include that conscience "is not an autonomous and exclusive authority for deciding the truth of a doctrine," which is directly from DONUM VERITATIS.
Nonetheless, while following one's own conscience cannot legitimate dissent according to Rome (though the church began in dissent from authority), yet it allows dissent for even a theologian "who might have serious difficulties, for reasons which appear to him wellfounded, in accepting a non-irreformable magisterial teaching."
And thus while Ratzinger upholds the need for a correctly formed conscience, which V2 allows for even outside the church, his statement* does not seem to be restricting obeying conscience only when it conforms to Rome's teaching, but that basically for the individual conscience is a type of ultimate tribunal, not as the supreme objective authority, but because conscience is what man acts out of, and thus it is appealed to for obedience.
"But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. " (2 Corinthians 4:2)
*Commenting on paragraph #16 of the above document, theologian Fr. Joseph Razinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) wrote in 1968:
Over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority, there still stands one's own conscience, which must be obeyed above all else, if necessary even against the requirement of ecclesiastical authority. This emphasis on the individual, whose conscience confronts him with a supreme and ultimate tribunal, and one which in the last resort is beyond the claim of external social groups, even of the official church, also establishes a principle in opposition to increasing totalitarianism. (http://www.ascensioncatholic.net/TOPICS/morality/ConscienceAndMoralDecisions.html and see here )
cf. 16. In the depths of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience..(GAUDIUM ET SPES)
Then your contention is with your church for ignoring it by sanctioning contrary notes for 40 years in its official American Bible.
The problem with your opinion is that it presupposes an infalliable bible written by falliable men. You can’t get from falliable to infalliable - but you can get from infalliable to infalliable.
“The problem with your opinion is that it presupposes an infalliable bible written by falliable men.”
I hear what you are saying. But the belief that the Bible is the absolute and true word of God means that we do believe that those men were mere instruments at the time of the writing. Though they were fallible men, when they wrote, they were “inspired” by the Holy Spirit. Of course much of Scripture repeats such things as “Thus saith the LORD,” and so forth. And the writings by the apostles show first that God ordained them particularly to do so.
Similarly, I think, the RC’s believe that the Popes, or perhaps the Magisterium, speak infallibly when speaking officially.
Of course I think the Bible does not teach that (being Protestant), but I hope I have stated the positions fairly.
“So answer his simple question. How do you know that 1 Timothy (for example) is inspired scripture?”
1. It claims to be so.
2. It is in sync with other Scripture; does not contradict it.
3. Its claimed author is an apostle, ordained by Jesus to teach and spread official doctrine. Of course, we know of Paul’s apostleship because of the book of Acts, thus as I confess, the reasoning is circular in that sense.
4. The Holy Spirit bears witness with our hearts that is is God speaking to us.
5. It was accepted and utilized as inspired so far as we know, historically, without any known, upheld formal objection.
6. There is no convincing reason to reject it as inspired.
That what should be properly canonical, and what should not in regards to Apochrypa, was still debated up to and finally at Trent (for the Latin church) is strong evidence that either; the Apochrypa was still properly considered open to debate as to deserving being on equal footing with the Hebrew books of the law and prophets or else a great many in the Latin church, including those whom had been made Cardinals, never got the memo that the canon had been closed prior to Trent. Which seriously weakens the argument you bring --- or shows that a great many Cardinals were themselves haphazardly instructed.
Similar to how things progressed in the East, having accessed those books for liturgical purposes was a large factor. Admission such had been even possibly a mistake was unthinkable for many, much like today there are those whom invoke all sorts of special pleadings to show the "church" (one branch in particular) has never erred.
Very well (I won’t squabble with 1, which calls St. Paul’s apostolship willed by God, but doesn’t exactly call the letter itself inspired). So you do not know 1-6 entirely from the Bible. You, rather, base your answer on reason, history, and guidance of the Holy Spirit in “us”. Would that be correct?
Further you answer is spoken from a group: you couch it in plural form and you yourself hardly could have compared every thought in 1 Timothy with every thought in other scripture (2); you personally could not have seen St. Paul convert and preach and your reliance of the Book of Acts is indeed circular (3); you use plural form in (4) and justly so as the Holy Spirit, reasonably, indwells not in you alone; you refer to history which you could not yourself witness in (5); and in (6) you could not personally be informed of every such objection and decide in favor of Timothy 1.
You speak on behalf of a community of believers, don’t you?
In my next question we shall examine what that community of believers must possess in order to ascertain (1-6).
It seems that your argument is that an assuredly inspired magisterium is necessary to establish writings as Divinely inspired, and for that matter, to sanction men of God as having authority. Thus those without it are spurious.
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