Luther and Erasmus: The Controversy Concerning the Bondage of the Will

Protestant Reformed Theological Journal ^ | April 1999 | Garrett J. Eriks

[Agrarian]

"We can argue that virgins can give birth, that uncircumscribed God can empty Himself into a body of a Man and still be God who is a Spirit everythwere and transcends time, but we can't prove it to others who don't believe it."

I agree. What I disagree with is the idea that anyone can disprove the historicity of Biblical accounts that have been treated by the Orthodox Church through the centuries as factually true. Your question of "so what if none of this is true?" thus has no relevance to those who believe.

But, what I do maintain is that if you accept the idea that scholars and scientists can disprove Biblical accounts that are treated by the Fathers up to this day as being historically true, then there is no logic whatsoever to believing that God became man, was born of a virgin, that a corpse rose from the dead and passed through stone wall, that that resurrected person ascended in the body into heaven, and that he will come again in the same manner but with glory, in that same resurrected body.

Why does your logic and acceptance of science (or rather your credulity in the face of it) reign supreme when it comes to whether Abraham, Isaac and Jacob actually existed -- but then when it comes to Christ, you believe in Him?

A key message of the New Testament is indeed love and mercy. It is right there in the words of Christ, and it is there that he tells us exactly the lens through which to read the OT: "on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." But the central message of the New Testament is not an abstract idea of love. It is a very concrete and explicit love: God becoming man and walking among us, taking on our human nature, making all things new.

And Christ tells us that the Patriarchs existed, and in fact that they are still alive in Paradise: "Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, not the power of God... as touching the resurrection of the dead have yet not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the Bod of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."

We are to believe in Christ, but not to believe his words? It is reasonable to believe that he rose from the dead but not to believe that his ancestors in the flesh of which he spoke were real people?

"Did Adam and Eve exist?" Well, the Apostles certainly treat it as such. "by one man sin entered into the world..." He is listed in the Biblical chronology of St. Luke of the ancestors of Christ. Christ himself speaks of Adam's son Abel as a real person in more than one place, saying in one: "That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias..."

I am certainly not claiming that I can prove any of this to modern scientific and historical satisfaction. Modern science and scholarship is united in its declaration that none of it is true. You know this -- I've read as you call the History Channel the Satanic channel or something like that. I am acutely aware, as you are, that modern science and historical scholarship tends to have a very clear agenda, and is not objective when it comes to Christianity.

You quote a Father who says that the Bible should be read for spiritual meaning. Of course this is true, and all the Fathers treat the Scriptures that way.. That is as old as the Bible itself. Think of St. Paul and his pointing out the allegorical meaning of the two sons of Abraham in Galatians.

But throughout, Abraham is also treated as a real person, and the stories as true. And neither do the Fathers ever say: "OK, here's the spiritual meaning of this or that story about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob -- but it didn't happen." This is the characteristic nature of Scripture -- there is not only one meaning, but many deep meanings that are simultaneously true. Ishmael and Isaac are allegories that really happened.

Picking at the historicity of the Bible is also as old as the Scriptures themselves. Look at the famous exchange between Julius Africanus and Origen over the historicity of the story of the story of Daniel and Suzannah, or the careful refutations by St. Augustine and others of the very early claims that the two different geneologies of Christ in the Gospels meant that probably neither was true. The entire idea of Christ having risen from the dead was mocked from the beginning, and defended from the beginning.

I completely agree with you that "historical, geographical, physical, (in)accuracy are not the measure against which the truth and value of the Scripture is tested." But what I strongly maintain that there is no value, and much danger, to one's spiritual life to go down the path of believing that most of Scripture is *only* metaphor and allegory.

[stripes1776]

I completely agree with you that "historical, geographical, physical, (in)accuracy are not the measure against which the truth and value of the Scripture is tested." But what I strongly maintain that there is no value, and much danger, to one's spiritual life to go down the path of believing that most of Scripture is *only* metaphor and allegory.

This is a moving discussion and I hope you don't mind me commenting. I am not Orthodox but Protestant, and one who reads Patristics and finds great meaning in contemporary Orthodox theology.

One of my favorite theologians is John Zizioulas. In an essay on eschatology in salvation history he contends that

we cannot place our security in what is given to us, or facts and substances graspable by our minds or senses. Facts do not decide in identifying beings: only the future can disclose the truth.

Zizioulas maintains that the importance of the Incarnation, God's primary revelation in history, takes its meaning from the Resurrection, an eschatological event, not a historical event. Indeed, all of history takes its meaning from the end, the eschaton--the coming of the kingdom--and not from history as fact.

In this scenario, the role of the Spirit is to take us out of history. That is not to destory history, but to acknowledge that history can only take its meaning from the future. The significance of history from an eschatological perspective is not in the facts.

[kosta50]

None has seen God. Yet, you have experienced Him and felt His presence. Do you believe because you read about Him or because His presence is something you experienced personally? What determines your faith, A? The Bible or God? I am always amused by the Protestants who say "I believe in the Bible." I don't; I believe in God. First God, then the Bible. Unless you believe in God, then the Bible is nothing. Jews believe in the same Five Books of Moses in which we see foretelling of the coming of Christ -- yet they don't see it and they don't believe it in Him!

History of the Jewish kings is irrelevant to my daily life; what is relevant is what they say in the Bible and what they do; the combined message. They might as well be fictitious for all I know, but it's the message behind the story that counts.

You say they all believed in the Prophets. So the Bible says. And for all practical purposes we believe it too, but it's not their historical reality or fiction that matters but the message they project.

As for historical veracity of the Bible, that is a matter of debate as you know. Very few things mentioned in it are readily verifiable, including any reference by anyone (save for Josephus, in pasisng, and some 30 years later, and based on what he has been told by Christians!) who make reference to Christ. If His presence was such a threat to the Jews and to Rome, something other than the Bible would surely be recorded. Yet, mysteriously, nothing of God's presence, no relics of His have been preseved, although they are the holiest of holies -- the ark, the tablets, the grail, the cross, etc.

We make sure our family hairlooms are passed on from generation to generation, yet we lose things God touched, save for a written account we call the Bible. Why? Because nothing else matters except His message, A. Things of this world that were His would become the subject of worship, people would fight over them, so God made sure nothing of His that is material is preserved. Only His Spirit.

[kosta50]

Stripes, you are always welcome and your input is most appreciated. It is a moving topic and not an easy one I must say.

I must disagree with Agrarian who stipulates that my position is that everyting in the Bible is only a metaphor or an allegory. I never said that.

What I did say is that historicity and scientific corroboration of the Bible is irrelevant because it is the message in God's revelation that matters more than hard, verifyable facts, such as whether Job was a real person or not, or whether Apostles beleived that bats are fowl, or that the earth was flat and sitting on four pillars, etc.

It's the eschatology, as you point out, or as Fr. John Zizioulas puts it "only the future can disclose the truth" or, as +Paul says "substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen," or "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."

Thanks for your input.

[Forest Keeper]

I watched on the Satanic TV (History/Discovery) not so long ago a "reconstruction" of what Jesus might have looked like! They dug up a skull of a man from that area and era, and showed how the Jewish skulls differed dimensionally from Gentile skulls ...

I saw that program. I'm not surprised to learn that they showed Him as being an impious Jew. I also remember asking myself: "what are they saying, that all Jews look alike"? :)

As I think of it, I am reminded of the depiction of Jesus and the disciples in "The Passion". IIRC, they didn't have below-the-shoulder length hair. If that's right, would that have been a mistake? Assuming you saw the movie, did any other mistakes jump out at you?

[annalex]

The relics of the Cross have certainly been preserved, see The True Cross and scroll down to III. RELICS OF THE TRUE CROSS.

The work of Rohault de Fleury, "Mémoire sur les instruments de la Passion" (Paris, 1870), deserves more prolonged attention; its author has sought out with great care and learning all the relics of the True Cross, drawn up a catalogue of them, and, thanks to this labour, he has succeeded in showing that, in spite of what various Protestant or Rationalistic authors have pretended, the fragments of the Cross brought together again would not only not "be comparable in bulk to a battleship", but would not reach one-third that of a cross ...

[annalex]

Other scientific study of the extant relics has been conducted which confirms that they are from a single species of tree. Four cross particles from European churches, i.e. S.Croce in Rome, Notre Dame, the cathedral of Pisa and the cathedral to Florenz, were microscopically examined. "The pieces came all together from olive." (Ziehr, William, Das Kreuz, Stuttgart 1997, Seite 63)

Wiki: True Cross

[annalex]

Shroud of Turin



Christ Pantocrator
(the earliest extant icon of Christ, Saint Catherine's Monastery, 550 AD)

Computerized overlay



computerized density average

In the 1930's, French Shroud scholar Paul Vignon described a series of common characteristics visible in many early artistic pictures of Jesus. The Vignon markings, as they are known, all appear on the Shroud suggesting that it is the source of later pictures of Jesus.

• A square U-shape between the eyebrows.
• A downward pointing triangle or V-shape just below the U-shape, on the bridge of the nose.
• Two wisps of hair going downward and then to the right.
• A raised right eyebrow.
• Large, seemingly "owlish" eyes. This may be the result of coins placed over the eyes.
• An accent on the left cheek and an accent on the right cheek that is somewhat lower.
• A forked beard. Dr. Whanger (see below) has suggested that this may the result of a chin band tied around the head to keep the mouth closed.
• An enlarged left nostril.
• An accent line below the nose and a dark line just below the lower lip.
• A gap in the beard below the lower lip.
• Hair on one side of the head that is shorter than on the other side

(All from Shroud History)

[Forest Keeper]

No, a person doesn't have to know of its existence, per sec, to be subject to the possibility of going there [hell]. However, a person of today does not necessarily believe it exists. It is a matter of faith. We trust that the Word we have received is from God and vouches for its existence - one that cannot be empirically proven until we witness its existence after our physical death.

I can't imagine a believer not believing in hell. If Jesus believed in it, that's good enough for me. :) It's the same with demons for me. I was on the fence for a while, but then I learned about the story where Jesus spoke to them. Case closed.

Are you saying that we, as believers, will witness the existence of hell after our physical deaths? I thought purgatory is different than hell.

Reciting the Sinner's prayer does not make someone Christ's sheep.

I agree that is not the causal element.

A person can follow Christ's voice for a time - and then choose to ignore it later. That person did not persevere.

I "think" you are saying that such as person was one of the sheep, but then left the fold. If true, then how do you interpret the certitude Jesus espouses in this passage?:

John 10:26-29 : 26 ... but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. 27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand.

So would the interpretation be that only some of His sheep follow Him, that He will give only some of His sheep eternal life, that only some of His sheep shall never perish, that no one, EXCEPT the sheep himself, can snatch the sheep out of either Christ's or the Father's hands? If so, then Jesus appeared to have quite a message problem.

[kosta50]

Thanks annalex. I will review the articles when I get a chance.

[Forest Keeper]

This is why I hesitate to agree that priestly celibacy can change merely to get more priests; for one thing, celibacy not only forms an obstacle for some, but it also attracts those who seek a more complete transformation of self. Celibacy connects to the theological fact that a priest is married to the Church. It is not likely to change as a matter of convenience.

Thanks very much for your comments, and for the great link to the differences between dogma, doctrine, and discipline. I found it interesting that the author said that priestly celibacy and the ordination of women are matters of discipline, the most easily changed. As an outsider, I have to say that from almost all of the Catholics I have spoken with, none of them thinks either of these will ever be changed, especially having women priests.

Unfortunately, Protestants are all over the place on the issue of women clergy. To my knowledge, Southern Baptists have not crossed that line yet, and have no plans to do so.

[Agrarian]

I did not watch "The Passion," so I can't comment on it.

[Agrarian]

The Orthodox tradition regarding the True Cross gives a clear account that the Cross was deliberately cut up into pieces and distributed throughout the Empire after its capture by the Persians and subsequent recovery. The Church did want a relic of such great importance ever to fall completely into the hands of non-Christians again.

One thing I noticed in the New Advent article you linked to was that the Cross was speculated to be made of pine. An interesting Orthodox Tradition is that it was made up of three different kinds of wood: pine, cedar, and cypress. It alludes to Isaiah 60:13 in the LXX as a prophecy of this.

I had not heard of the work of de Fleury -- I never doubted that the rationastic stories about the relics of the True Cross were gross exaggerations with a definite agenda, but I hadn't learned that anyone had done the work to disprove such tales.

[annalex]

the ordination of women are matters of discipline

That surprised me, but it seems that the author knows what he is talking about. Ordination of women surely connects to some dogmatic things, such as Christ is the bridegroom of the Church, and that a priest is in the person of Christ in his priestly function. That seems to give the priesthood a dogmatically masculine character even though the nature of the issue is that of discipline.

It is a common trick among the Church's left today, to draw distinctions between disciplines and dogmata, while neglecting to mention that disciplines are not papal whims either.

[kosta50]

Last time I checked, there was none of Jesus' followers when He died, except for His Mother and Apostle John. I seriously doubt that anyone could have stolen a cross that easily weighed several hundred pounds and not be seen by either the Jews or the Romans, be it day or night.

Maybe the wood is the same wood, but how do we know that the wood came the Cross. Like I said, God left us nothing material to fight over, nothing material is equal to God. He left us only His Spirit through His Word.

[kosta50]

they didn't have below-the-shoulder length hair. If that's right, would that have been a mistake? Assuming you saw the movie, did any other mistakes jump out at you?

I didn't pay that much attention to their hair, to be honest with you. I was very pleased that many of the demons were shown as children, which is very believable. I was also quite impressed with the role of the actress who played Blessed Mary, Mother of God. You don't see a single incident of anger or even a grimace on her face, other then a very pained look in her eyes that remain focused only on Her Son and never on anyone else. There was no anger, no judgment in her.

Of course, Judas' death can always be a "mistake" since the Gospels give two different accounts on how he died. Much of the imagery came not from the Gospels but from an 18th century Roman Catholic nun's "visions."

Despite all the blood and gore, I am not sure what Mel Gibson was trying to show. The central part of Christianity is in Resurrection which is given about 5 seconds in the movie, the rest is a pretty much Gospel story of the last 72 hours of His life on earth.

Pious Jews today still don't cut off the sides of their hair or beard. Orthodox clergy (for some reason) chose to continue that OT tradition. The reason for not grooming your hair is to avoid vanity and self-centerdness, such a sis obvious when you see some Orthodox priests with a neatly trimmed goatee.

[jo kus]

I can't imagine a believer not believing in hell. If Jesus believed in it, that's good enough for me. :) It's the same with demons for me. I was on the fence for a while, but then I learned about the story where Jesus spoke to them. Case closed.

Do you HAVE to know the existence of hell to be able to love? Christ abides in those who love, even the man in the Amazon jungle. Does he know about the Christian concept of hell? Who cares. He who has Christ has life. Of course, this is the lowest common denominator. We are not subject to that level of knowledge. Who in America can say "I never heard about hell?" God will not punish someone for ignorance, if it is beyond their control.

Are you saying that we, as believers, will witness the existence of hell after our physical deaths? I thought purgatory is different than hell.

I think when you see Christ during judgment, hell will exist by default. I doubt whether we will be given the grand tour...

I said : Reciting the Sinner's prayer does not make someone Christ's sheep.

You responded: I agree that is not the causal element.

So the Sinner's Prayer does not make someone elect. Well, that's a start.

I "think" you are saying that such as person was one of the sheep, but then left the fold. If true, then how do you interpret the certitude Jesus espouses in this passage?:

I don't think anyone, from man's point of view, can KNOW they are of the sheep onto eternal happiness. Looking back, we'll see we were all along. But I don't see our initial justification, our initial healing (saving) as the end of the road. Otherwise, it would make pointless all of those many verses that talk about perseverance, falling away, and being judged for heaven or hell based on our works of love or lack thereof.

All the sheep will receive eternal life. But that "separation" will not occur until the final judgment. For example, consider Mat 25 and the Sheep/Goat parable. Christ KNOWS who is a sheep and who is a goat. The "animals" don't separate themselves. Christ does. Nor do the "animals" recognize Christ in their actions of goodness or refusal to do good. Another parable is the wheat and cockles. The wheat looks identical to the cockles - and thus, only upon judgment will the wheat be separated from the weeds. In both cases, you are already doing the separating. You are judging yourself, not Christ. It is ONLY Christ who KNOWS who will be the wheat/weed FOR CERTAIN and who is the sheep/goat. WE can have an idea today, but that doesn't necessitate that we always were and will be the elect.

Regards

[Agrarian]

Your comments are very welcome. This discussion, from my perspective, has basically to do with one's "default setting" with regard to the Tradition of the Church. My default setting is to believe the Tradition, from Genesis on down, in the way understood by the Church. An approach of skepticism toward this Tradition has never been a part of Orthodoxy.

Kosta writes: "I must disagree with Agrarian who stipulates that my position is that everyting in the Bible is only a metaphor or an allegory. I never said that."

I am well aware that Kosta did not say that. But the clear implication that has come across in this discussion is that it wouldn't matter *if* everything in the Bible that the Church has considered to be factually true were "disproved" by scientists and historians. I would challenge Kosta to find anyone in the New Testament or amongst the Fathers who have said or implied anything of that nature.

My reply, furthermore, is that scientists and historians *have* disproved and rendered as fables the possibility of every key event and story of Christian history, from Adam down to Christ. Since Kosta watches the History channel, he already knows this.

My question to someone who accepts with credulity the proclamations of historians that the Patriarchs and Prophets didn't exist, why don't you believe modern science and historians on those things about Christ, too? Or do you? And having accepted that science and history is correct, what meaning does Christianity have for you?

Or, on the other hand, if one believes the witness of the Church about Christ, in the face of universal scientific and historical opinion that little if any of it is true, then why would one apply a separate standard to the Old Testament that Christ and the Apostles treated as true?

The plain fact is that at the very least, the historicity of Christ and his Resurrection matters. Or at least, that is what St. Paul says in I Corinthians:

"Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?

But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.

Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.

For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.

Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable."


In other words, St. Paul says that if Christ did not rise in the body from the dead, they as Apostles are lying, the faith they preach is meaningless, and those of us who follow Christianity are the most miserable of all men. Modern science and history says exactly that: Christ didn't rise from the dead, the Apostles *were* either lying or engaged in some phenomenon of mass delusion/hysteria, and that Christianity is nonsense. It would furthermore seem that St. Paul was dealing with those who thought that Christ's physical resurrection wasn't true or any importance.

St John writes in his epistle: "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life..."

In other words, "we knew the Lord who was present at the creation of the world. We heard him speak, we saw him, and we touched him." Modern science and history would say that St. John was either deluded or lying when he wrote those words.

And St. Peter, writing years after Christ's ascension, says this as he remembers his experiences at the Transfiguration -- another event that modern science and history has shown to be an impossibility and a made-up story:

"For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount."

It is obvious that St. Peter was already dealing with the skeptics, who were saying that the stories that the Apostles told of Christ were just "cunningly devised fables."

When the apostles deliberated on who should replace Judas as one of the 12, they specified that the only men to be considered would be those who, like them, had been eyewitnesses of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. It was only after being convinced that the resurrected Christ had personally and directly appeared to St. Paul that he was accepted by them as a fellow-apostle.

With all due respect to Zizioulas (whom I have never read), if he is truly maintaining that the Resurrection of Christ is "an eschatological event, not a historical event", the path that he seems to be taking is very well-trodden. It is the path of modern liberal agnostic Protestantism, and the skeptical path of much of post-Vat II Catholicism. I know it well.

The events of the life of Christ are of cosmic significance. And the types and recapitulations of the Old Testament that led up to him are of eschatological magnitude. I completely agree with that. But they all start with the knowledge that God became man and walked among us. And if we are prepared to believe *that*, then I fail to see why we wouldn't have the default setting of believing the rest of the Christian revelation.

You will notice that at *no* point in this discussion have I ever tried to use historical, scientific, or logical arguments in an attempt to "prove" the historicity of the Bible. I do not believe that such a thing is possible, and I think that the fundamentalist Protestants who engage in such attempts are misguided, foolish, and setting themselves up for a fall.

I have, rather, restricted myself to what the Church has seemed always to restrict herself to in its understanding of the Scriptures and of our entire faith: the revealed Tradition of the Church. I have used the internal evidence and statements of the Church, from Christ and the Apostles to the Fathers. This is the way of patristic theology, and when combined with the prayers of the Church, it is precisely what leads us to the deep significances and understandings that are indeed beyond the mere facts of history.

And with that, I think that I will try bring my part of this to a close, asking forgiveness of all I have offended.

[Agrarian]

This is a big difference between Orthodoxy and the RC church. We do not have this kind of sharp distinction, by and large, between discipline and dogma.

We consider the Tradition to be one seamless whole, and do not believe that there are parts that can be changed at will, just because they are not dogmatic. The fact that something has been the universal tradition of the Church for 2000 years makes it basically unchangable.

I have talked to traditionalist Roman Catholics who acknowledge this: namely that Orthodoxy is far more immune to the prospect of women priests than is Catholicism, precisely because we do not believe that anyone has the authority to change a tradition of this universality and duration. Some have told me that they are glad that the Orthodox Church exists, since it gives them something to argue with when dealing with the modernists: telling them that such a change would render reunion with Orthodoxy impossible.

[annalex]

Yup.

The fallacy is, of course, that empirical or experimental science is limited to the work of discovering and applying truths about the material world. If there is a spiritual presence in the material world, physical science will not discover it; and if we discover it, physical science will have no idea of what it means.

(Scientism)