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

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

[HarleyD]

Introduction

At the time of the Reformation, many hoped Martin Luther and Erasmus could unite against the errors of the Roman Catholic Church. Luther himself was tempted to unite with Erasmus because Erasmus was a great Renaissance scholar who studied the classics and the Greek New Testament. Examining the Roman Catholic Church, Erasmus was infuriated with the abuses in the Roman Catholic Church, especially those of the clergy. These abuses are vividly described in the satire of his book, The Praise of Folly. Erasmus called for reform in the Roman Catholic Church. Erasmus could have been a great help to the Reformation, so it seemed, by using the Renaissance in the service of the Reformation.

But a great chasm separated these two men. Luther loved the truth of God's Word as that was revealed to him through his own struggles with the assurance of salvation. Therefore Luther wanted true reformation in the church, which would be a reformation in doctrine and practice. Erasmus cared little about a right knowledge of truth. He simply wanted moral reform in the Roman Catholic Church. He did not want to leave the church, but remained supportive of the Pope.

This fundamental difference points out another difference between the two men. Martin Luther was bound by the Word of God. Therefore the content of the Scripture was of utmost importance to him. But Erasmus did not hold to this same high view of Scripture. Erasmus was a Renaissance rationalist who placed reason above Scripture. Therefore the truth of Scripture was not that important to him.

The two men could not have fellowship with each other, for the two movements which they represented were antithetical to each other. The fundamental differences came out especially in the debate over the freedom of the will.

From 1517 on, the chasm between Luther and Erasmus grew. The more Luther learned about Erasmus, the less he wanted anything to do with him. Melanchthon tried to play the mediator between Luther and Erasmus with no success. But many hated Erasmus because he was so outspoken against the church. These haters of Erasmus tried to discredit him by associating him with Luther, who was outside the church by this time. Erasmus continued to deny this unity, saying he did not know much about the writings of Luther. But as Luther took a stronger stand against the doctrinal abuses of Rome, Erasmus was forced either to agree with Luther or to dissociate himself from Luther. Erasmus chose the latter.

Many factors came together which finally caused Erasmus to wield his pen against Luther. Erasmus was under constant pressure from the Pope and later the king of England to refute the views of Luther. When Luther became more outspoken against Erasmus, Erasmus finally decided to write against him. On September 1, 1524, Erasmus published his treatise On the Freedom of the Will. In December of 1525, Luther responded with The Bondage of the Will.

Packer and Johnston call The Bondage of the Will "the greatest piece of theological writing that ever came from Luther's pen."1 Although Erasmus writes with eloquence, his writing cannot compare with that of Luther the theologian. Erasmus writes as one who cares little about the subject, while Luther writes with passion and conviction, giving glory to God. In his work, Luther defends the heart of the gospel over against the Pelagian error as defended by Erasmus. This controversy is of utmost importance.

In this paper, I will summarize both sides of the controversy, looking at what each taught and defended. Secondly, I will examine the biblical approach of each man. Finally, the main issues will be pointed out and the implications of the controversy will be drawn out for the church today.

Erasmus On the Freedom of the Will

Erasmus defines free-will or free choice as "a power of the human will by which a man can apply himself to the things which lead to eternal salvation or turn away from them." By this, Erasmus means that man has voluntary or free power of himself to choose the way which leads to salvation apart from the grace of God.

Erasmus attempts to answer the question how man is saved: Is it the work of God or the work of man according to his free will? Erasmus answers that it is not one or the other. Salvation does not have to be one or the other, for God and man cooperate. On the one hand, Erasmus defines free-will, saying man can choose freely by himself, but on the other hand, he wants to retain the necessity of grace for salvation. Those who do good works by free-will do not attain the end they desire unless aided by God's grace. Therefore, in regard to salvation, man cooperates with God. Both must play their part in order for a man to be saved. Erasmus expresses it this way: "Those who support free choice nonetheless admit that a soul which is obstinate in evil cannot be softened into true repentance without the help of heavenly grace." Also, attributing all things to divine grace, Erasmus states,

And the upshot of it is that we should not arrogate anything to ourselves but attribute all things we have received to divine grace … that our will might be synergos (fellow-worker) with grace although grace is itself sufficient for all things and has no need of the assistance of any human will."

In his work On the Freedom of the Will, Erasmus defends this synergistic view of salvation. According to Erasmus, God and man, nature and grace, cooperate together in the salvation of a man. With this view of salvation, Erasmus tries to steer clear of outright Pelagianism and denies the necessity of human action which Martin Luther defends.

On the basis of an apocryphal passage (Ecclesiasticas 15:14-17), Erasmus begins his defense with the origin of free-will. Erasmus says that Adam, as he was created, had a free-will to choose good or to turn to evil. In Paradise, man's will was free and upright to choose. Adam did not depend upon the grace of God, but chose to do all things voluntarily. The question which follows is, "What happened to the will when Adam sinned; does man still retain this free-will?" Erasmus would answer, "Yes." Erasmus says that the will is born out of a man's reason. In the fall, man's reason was obscured but was not extinguished. Therefore the will, by which we choose, is depraved so that it cannot change its ways. The will serves sin. But this is qualified. Man's ability to choose freely or voluntarily is not hindered.

By this depravity of the will, Erasmus does not mean that man can do no good. Because of the fall, the will is "inclined" to evil, but can still do good. Notice, he says the will is only "inclined" to evil. Therefore the will can freely or voluntarily choose between good and evil. This is what he says in his definition: free-will is "a power of the human will by which a man can apply himself to the things which lead to eternal salvation." Not only does the human will have power, although a little power, but the will has power by which a man merits salvation.

This free choice of man is necessary according to Erasmus in order for there to be sin. In order for a man to be guilty of sin, he must be able to know the difference between good and evil, and he must be able to choose between doing good and doing evil. A man is responsible only if he has the ability to choose good or evil. If the free-will of man is taken away, Erasmus says that man ceases to be a man.

For this freedom of the will, Erasmus claims to find much support in Scripture. According to Erasmus, when Scripture speaks of "choosing," it implies that man can freely choose. Also, whenever the Scripture uses commands, threats, exhortations, blessings, and cursings, it follows that man is capable of choosing whether or not he will obey.

Erasmus defines the work of man's will by which he can freely choose after the fall. Here he makes distinctions in his idea of a "threefold kind of law" which is made up of the "law of nature, law of works, and law of faith." First, this law of nature is in all men. By this law of nature, men do good by doing to others what they would want others to do to them. Having this law of nature, all men have a knowledge of God. By this law of nature, the will can choose good, but the will in this condition is useless for salvation. Therefore more is needed. The law of works is man's choice when he hears the threats of punishment which God gives. When a man hears these threats, he either continues to forsake God, or he desires God's grace. When a man desires God's grace, he then receives the law of faith which cures the sinful inclinations of his reason. A man has this law of faith only by divine grace.

In connection with this threefold kind of law, Erasmus distinguishes between three graces of God. First, in all men, even in those who remain in sin, a grace is implanted by God. But this grace is infected by sin. This grace arouses men by a certain knowledge of God to seek Him. The second grace is peculiar grace which arouses the sinner to repent. This does not involve the abolishing of sin or justification. But rather, a man becomes "a candidate for the highest grace." By this grace offered to all men, God invites all, and the sinner must come desiring God's grace. This grace helps the will to desire God. The final grace is the concluding grace which completes what was started. This is saving grace only for those who come by their free-will. Man begins on the path to salvation, after which God completes what man started. Along with man's natural abilities according to his will, God works by His grace. This is the synergos, or cooperation, which Erasmus defends.

Erasmus defends the free-will of man with a view to meriting salvation. This brings us to the heart of the matter. Erasmus begins with the premise that a man merits salvation. In order for a man to merit salvation, he cannot be completely carried by God, but he must have a free-will by which he chooses God voluntarily. Therefore, Erasmus concludes that by the exercise of his free-will, man merits salvation with God. When man obeys, God imputes this to his merit. Therefore Erasmus says, "This surely goes to show that it is not wrong to say that man does something…." Concerning the merit of man's works, Erasmus distinguishes with the Scholastics between congruent and condign merit. The former is that which a man performs by his own strength, making him a "fit subject for the gift of internal grace." This work of man removed the barrier which keeps God from giving grace. The barrier removed is man's unworthiness for grace, which God gives only to those who are fit for it. With the gift of grace, man can do works which before he could not do. God rewards these gifts with salvation. Therefore, with the help or aid of the grace of God, a man merits eternal salvation.

Although he says a man merits salvation, Erasmus wants to say that salvation is by God's grace. In order to hold both the free-will of man and the grace of God in salvation, Erasmus tries to show the two are not opposed to each other. He says, "It is not wrong to say that man does something yet attributes the sum of all he does to God as the author." Explaining the relationship between grace and free-will, Erasmus says that the grace of God and the free-will of man, as two causes, come together in one action "in such a way, however, that grace is the principle cause and the will secondary, which can do nothing apart from the principle cause since the principle is sufficient in itself." Therefore, in regard to salvation, God and man work together. Man has a free-will, but this will cannot attain salvation of itself. The will needs a boost from grace in order to merit eternal life.

Erasmus uses many pictures to describe the relationship between works and grace. He calls grace an "advisor," "helper," and "architect." Just as the builder of a house needs the architect to show him what to do and to set him straight when he does something wrong, so also man needs the assistance of God to help him where he is lacking. The free-will of man is aided by a necessary helper: grace. Therefore Erasmus says, "as we show a boy an apple and he runs for it ... so God knocks at our soul with His grace and we willingly embrace it." In this example, we are like a boy who cannot walk. The boy wants the apple, but he needs his father to assist him in obtaining the apple. So also, we need the assistance of God's grace. Man has a free-will by which he can seek after God, but this is not enough for him to merit salvation. By embracing God's grace with his free-will, man merits God's grace so that by his free-will and the help of God's grace he merits eternal life. This is a summary of what Erasmus defends.

Erasmus also deals with the relationship of God's foreknowledge and man's free-will. On the one hand, God does what he wills, but, on the other hand, God's will does not impose anything on man's will, for then man's will would not be free or voluntary. Therefore God's foreknowledge is not determinative, but He simply knows what man will choose. Men deserve punishment from eternity simply because God knows they will not choose the good, but will choose the evil. Man can resist the ordained will of God. The only thing man cannot resist is when God wills in miracles. When God performs some "supernatural" work, this cannot be resisted by men. For example, when Jesus performed a miracle, the man whose sight returned could not refuse to be healed. According to Erasmus, because man's will is free, God's will and foreknowledge depend on man's will except when He performs miracles.

This is a summary of what Erasmus taught in his treatise On the Freedom of the Will. In response to this treatise, Luther wrote The Bondage of the Will. We turn to this book of Luther.

Luther's Arguments Against Erasmus

Martin Luther gives a thorough defense of the sovereign grace of God over against the "semi-Pelagianism" of Erasmus by going through much of Erasmus' On the Freedom of the Will phrase by phrase. Against the cooperating work of salvation defended by Erasmus, Luther attacks Erasmus at the very heart of the issue. Luther's thesis is that "free-will is a nonentity, a thing consisting of name alone" because man is a slave to sin. Therefore salvation is the sovereign work of God alone.

In the "Diatribe," Luther says, Erasmus makes no sense. It seems Erasmus speaks out of both sides of his mouth. On the one hand, he says that man's will cannot will any good, yet on the other hand, he says man has a free-will. Other contradictions also exist in Erasmus' thought. Erasmus says that man has the power to choose good, but he also says that man needs grace to do good. Opposing Erasmus, Luther rightly points out that if there is free-will, there is no need for grace. Because of these contradictions in Erasmus, Luther says Erasmus "argues like a man drunk or asleep, blurting out between snores, 'Yes,' 'No.' " Not only does this view of Erasmus not make sense, but this is not what Scripture says concerning the will of man and the grace of God.

According to Luther, Erasmus does not prove his point, namely, the idea that man with his free-will cooperates in salvation with God. Throughout his work, Luther shows that Erasmus supports and agrees with the Pelagians. In fact, Erasmus' view is more despicable than Pelagianism because he is not honest and because the grace of God is cheapened. Only a small work is needed in order for a man to merit the grace of God.

Because Erasmus does not take up the question of what man can actually do of himself as fallen in Adam, Luther takes up the question of the ability of man. Here, Luther comes to the heart of his critique of the Diatribe in which he denies free-will and shows that God must be and is sovereign in salvation. Luther's arguments follow two lines: first, he shows that man is enslaved to sin and does not have a free-will; secondly, he shows that the truth of God's sovereign rule, by which He accomplishes His will according to His counsel, is opposed to free-will.

First, Luther successfully defends the thesis that there is no such entity as free-will because the will is enslaved to sin. Luther often says there is no such thing as free-will. The will of man without the grace of God "is not free at all, but is the permanent prisoner and bondslave of evil since it cannot turn itself to good." The free-will lost its freedom in the fall so that now the will is a slave to sin. This means the will can will no good. Therefore man does and wills sin "necessarily." Luther further describes the condition of man's will when he explains a passage from Ezekiel: "It cannot but fall into a worse condition, and add to its sins despair and impenitence unless God comes straightway to its help and calls it back and raises it up by the word of His promise."

Luther makes a crucial distinction in explaining what he means when he says man sins "necessarily." This does not mean "compulsion." A man without the Spirit is not forced, kicking and screaming, to sin but voluntarily does evil. Nevertheless, because man is enslaved to sin, his will cannot change itself. He only wills or chooses to sin of himself. He cannot change this willingness of his: he wills and desires evil. Man is wholly evil, thinking nothing but evil thoughts. Therefore there is no free-will.

Because this is the condition of man, he cannot merit eternal life. The enslaved will cannot merit anything with God because it can do no good. The only thing which man deserves is eternal punishment. By this, Luther also shows that there is no free-will.

In connection with man's merit, Luther describes the true biblical uses of the law. The purpose of the law of God is not to show men how they can merit salvation, but the law is given so that men might see their sinfulness and their own unworthiness. The law condemns the works of man, for when he judges himself according to the law, man sees that he can do no good. Therefore, he is driven to the cross. The law also serves as a guide for what the believer should do. But the law does not say anything about the ability of man to obey it.

Not only should the idea of free-will be rejected because man is enslaved to sin, but also because of who God is and the relationship between God and man. A man cannot act independently of God. Analyzing what Erasmus said, Luther says that God is not God, but He is an idol, because the freedom of man rules. Everything depends on man for salvation. Therefore man can merit salvation apart from God. A God that depends on man is not God.

Denying this horrible view of Erasmus, Luther proclaims the sovereignty of God in salvation. Because God is sovereign in all things and especially in salvation, there is no free-will.

Luther begins with the fact that God alone has a free-will. This means only God can will or not will the law, gospel, sin, and death. God does not act out of necessity, but freely. He alone is independent in all He decrees and does. Therefore man cannot have a free-will by which he acts independently of God, because God is immutable, omnipotent, and sovereign over all. Luther says that God is omnipotent, knowing all. Therefore we do nothing of ourselves. We can only act according to God's infallible, immutable counsel.

The great error of free-willism is that it ascribes divinity to man's free-will. God is not God anymore. If man has a free-will, this implies God is not omnipotent, controlling all of our actions. Free-will also implies that God makes mistakes and changes. Man must then fix the mistakes. Over against this, Luther says there can be no free-will because we are under the "mastery of God." We can do nothing apart from God by our own strength because we are enslaved to sin.

Luther also understands the difficulties which follow from saying that God is sovereign so that all things happen necessarily. Luther states: "If God foreknows a thing, it necessarily happens." The problem between God's foreknowledge and man's freedom cannot be completely solved. God sovereignly decrees all things that happen, and they happen as He has decreed them necessarily. Does this mean that when a man sins, he sins because God has decreed that sin? Luther would answer, Yes. But God does not act contrary to what man is. Man cannot will good, but he only seeks after sinful lusts. The nature of man is corrupted, so that he is turned from God. But God works in men and in Satan according to what they are. The sinner is still under the control of the omnipotent God, "which means, since they are evil and perverted themselves, that when they are impelled to action by this movement of Divine omnipotence they do only that which is perverted or evil." When God works in evil men, evil results. But God is not evil. He is good. He does not do evil, but He uses evil instruments. The sin is the fault of those evil instruments and not the fault of God.

Luther asks himself the question, Why then did God let Adam fall so all men have his sin? The sovereignty of God must not be questioned, because God's will is beyond any earthly standard. Nothing is equal to God and His will. Answering the question above, Luther replies, "What God wills is not right because He ought or was bound, so to will, on the contrary, what takes place must be right because He so wills it." This is the hidden mystery of God's absolute sovereignty over all things.

God is sovereign over all things. He is sovereign in salvation. Is salvation a work of God and man? Luther answers negatively. God alone saves. Therefore salvation cannot be based on the merits of men's works. Man's obedience does not obtain salvation, according to Luther. Some become the sons of God "not by carnal birth, nor by zeal for the law, nor by any other human effort, but only by being born of God." Grace does not come by our own effort, but by the grace of Jesus Christ. To deny grace is to deny Jesus Christ. For Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Free-will says that it is the way, the truth, and the life. Therefore free-will denies Jesus Christ. This is a serious error.

God saves by His grace and Spirit in such away that the will is turned by Him. Only when the will is changed can it will and desire the good. Luther describes a struggle between God and Satan. Erasmus says man stands between God and Satan, who are as spectators waiting for man to make his choice. But Luther compares this struggle to a horse having two riders. "If God rides, it wills and goes where God goes…. If Satan rides, it wills and goes where Satan goes." The horse does not have the choice of which rider it wants. We have Satan riding us until God throws him off. In the same way, we are enslaved to sin until God breaks the power of sin. The salvation of a man depends upon the free work of God, who alone is sovereign and able to save men. Therefore this work in the will by God is a radical change whereby the willing of the soul is freed from sin. This beautiful truth stands over against Erasmus' grace, which gives man a booster shot in what he can do of himself.

This truth of the sovereignty of God in salvation is comforting to us. When man trusts in himself, he has no comfort that he is saved. Because man is enslaved to sin and because God is the sovereign, controlling all things according to His sovereign, immutable will, there is no free-will. The free-will of man does not save him. God alone saves.

The Battle of the Biblical Texts

The battle begins with the fundamental difference separating Luther and Erasmus in regard to the doctrine of Scripture. Erasmus defends the obscurity of Scripture. Basically, Erasmus says man cannot know with certainty many of the things in Scripture. Some things in God's Word are plain, while many are not. He applies the obscurity of Scripture to the controversy concerning the freedom of the will. In the camp of the hidden things of God, which include the hour of our death and when the last judgment will occur, Erasmus places "whether our will accomplishes anything in things pertaining to salvation." Because Scripture is unclear about these things, what one believes about these matters is not important. Erasmus did not want controversy, but he wanted peace. For him, the discussion of the hidden things is worthless because it causes the church to lose her love and unity.

Against this idea of the obscurity of Scripture, Luther defends the perspicuity of Scripture. Luther defines perspicuity as being twofold. The external word itself is clear, as that which God has written for His people. But man cannot understand this word of himself. Therefore Scripture is clear to God's people only by the work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts.

The authority of Scripture is found in God Himself. God's Word must not be measured by man, for this leads to paradoxes, of which Erasmus is a case in point. By saying Scripture is paradoxical, Erasmus denies the authority of God's Word.

Luther does not deny that some passages are difficult to understand. This is not because the Word is unclear or because the work of the Holy Spirit is weak. Rather, we do not understand some passages because of our own weakness.

If Scripture is obscure, then this opposes what God is doing in revelation. Scripture is light which reveals the truth. If it is obscure, then why did God give it to us? According to Luther, not even the difficult to understand doctrines such as the Trinity, the Incarnation, and the unpardonable sin are obscure. Therefore the issue of the freedom of the will is not obscure. If the Scripture is unclear about the doctrine of the will of man, then this doctrine is not from Scripture.

Because Scripture is clear, Luther strongly attacks Erasmus on this fundamental point. Luther says, "The Scriptures are perfectly clear in their teaching, and that by their help such a defense of our position may be made that our adversaries cannot resist." This is what Luther hoped to show to Erasmus. The teaching of Scripture is fundamental. On this point of perspicuity, Luther has Erasmus by the horns. Erasmus says Scripture is not clear on this matter of the freedom of the will, yet he appeals to the church fathers for support. The church fathers base their doctrine of the free-will on Scripture. On the basis of the perspicuity of Scripture, Luther challenges Erasmus to find even one passage that supports his view of free-will. Luther emphasizes that not one can be found.

Luther also attacks Erasmus when he says what one believes concerning the freedom of the will does not matter. Luther sums up Erasmus' position this way: "In a word, what you say comes to this: that you do not think it matters a scrap what any one believes anywhere, as long as the world is at peace." Erasmus says the knowledge of free-will is useless and non-essential. Over against this, Luther says, "then neither God, Christ, Gospel, faith, nor anything else even of Judaism, let alone Christianity, is left!" Positively, Luther says about the importance of the truth: "I hold that a solemn and vital truth, of eternal consequences, is at stake in the discussion." Luther was willing to defend the truth even to death because of its importance as that which is taught in Scripture.

A word must also be said about the differing views of the interpretation of Scripture. Erasmus was not an exegete. He was a great scholar of the languages, but this did not make him an able exegete. Erasmus does not rely on the Word of God of itself, but he turns to the church fathers and to reason for the interpretation of Scripture. In regard to the passage out of Ecclesiasticas which Erasmus uses, Luther says the dispute there is not over the teaching of Scripture, but over human reason. Erasmus generalizes from a particular case, saying that since a passage mentions willing, this must mean a man has a free-will. In this regard, Luther also says that Erasmus "fashions and refashions the words of God as he pleases." Erasmus was concerned not with what God says in His Word, but with what he wanted God to say.

Not only does Erasmus use his own reason to interpret Scripture, but following in the Roman Catholic tradition he goes back to the church fathers. His work is filled with many quotes from the church fathers' interpretation of different passages. The idea is that the church alone has the authority to interpret Scripture. Erasmus goes so far in this that Luther accuses Erasmus of placing the fathers above the inspired apostle Paul.

In contrast to Erasmus, Luther interprets Scripture with Scripture. Seeing the Word of God as inspired by the Holy Spirit, Luther also trusts in the work of the Holy Spirit to interpret that Word. One of the fundamental points of Reformed hermeneutics is that Scripture interprets Scripture. Luther follows this. When Luther deals with a passage, he does not take it out of context as Erasmus does. Instead, he examines the context and checks other passages which use the same words.

Also, Luther does not add figures or devise implications as Erasmus does. But rather, Luther sticks to the simple and plain meaning of Scripture. He says, "Everywhere we should stick to just the simple, natural meaning of the words, as yielded by the rules of grammar and the habits of speech that God has created among men." In the controversy over the bondage of the will, both the formal and material principles of the Reformation were at stake.

Now we must examine some of the important passages for each man. This is a difficult task because they both refer to so many passages. We must content ourselves with looking at those which are fundamental for the main points of the controversy.

Showing the weakness of his view of Scripture, Erasmus begins with a passage from an apocryphal book: Ecclesiasticas 15:14-17. Erasmus uses this passage to show the origin of the free will and that the will continues to be free after the fall.

Following this passage, Erasmus looks at many passages from the Old Testament to prove that man has a free-will. He turns to Genesis 4:6, 7, which records God speaking to Cain after he offered his displeasing sacrifice to God. Verse 7 says, "If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door." Erasmus says that God sets before Cain a reward if he chooses the good. But if he chooses the evil, he will be punished. This implies that Cain has a will which can overcome evil and do the good.

From here, Erasmus looks at different passages using the word "choose." He says Scripture uses the word "choose" because man can freely choose. This is the only way it makes sense.

Erasmus also looks at many passages which use the word "if" in the Old Testament and also the commands of the Old Testament. For example, Isaiah 1:19,20 and 21:12 use the words "if … then." These conditions in Scripture imply that a man can do these things. Deuteronomy 30:14 is an example of a command. In this passage, Israel is commanded to love God with all their heart and soul. This command was given because Moses and the people had it in them to obey. Erasmus comes to these conclusions by implication.

Using a plethora of New Testament texts, Erasmus tries to support the idea of the freedom of the will. Once again, Erasmus appeals to those texts which speak of conditions. John 14:15 says, "If ye love me, keep my commandments." Also, in John 15:7 we read, "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you." These passages imply that man is able to fulfill the conditions by his free-will.

Remarkably, Erasmus identifies Paul as "the champion of free choice." Referring to passages in which Paul exhorts and commands, Erasmus says that this implies the ability to obey. An example is I Corinthians 9:24,25: "Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible." Man is able to obey this command because he has a free-will.

These texts can be placed together because Luther responds to them as a whole. Luther does treat many of these texts separately, but often comes back to the same point. Luther's response to Genesis 4:7 applies to all of the commands and conditions to which Erasmus refers: "Man is shown, not what he can do, but what he ought to do." Similarly, Luther responds to Deuteronomy 30:19: "It is from this passage that I derive my answer to you: that by the words of the law man is admonished and taught, not what he can do, but what he ought to do; that is, that he may know sin, not that he may believe that he has any strength." The exhortations and commands of the New Testament given through the apostle Paul are not written to show what we can do, but rather, after the gospel is preached, they encourage those justified and saved to live in the Spirit.

From these passages, Erasmus also taught that man merited salvation by his obedience or a man merited punishment by his disobedience, all of which was based on man's ability according to his free-will. Erasmus jumps from reward to merit. He does this in the conditional phrases of Scripture especially. But Luther says that merit is not proved from reward. God uses rewards in Scripture to exhort us and threaten us so that the godly persevere. Rewards are not that which a man merits.

The heart of the battle of the biblical texts is found in their treatment of passages from the book of Romans, especially Romans 9. Here, Erasmus treats Romans 9 as a passage which seems to oppose the freedom of the will but does not.

Erasmus begins his treatment of Romans 9 by considering the hardening of Pharaoh's heart. He treats this in connection with what Romans 9:18 says, "Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will, he hardeneth." To interpret this passage, Erasmus turns to Jerome, who says, "God hardens when he does not at once punish the sinner and has mercy as soon as he invites repentance by means of afflictions." God's hardening and mercy are the results of what man does. God has mercy "on those who recognize the goodness of God and repent…." Also, this hardening is not something which God does, but something which Pharaoh did by not repenting. God was longsuffering to Pharaoh, not punishing him immediately, during which Pharaoh hardened his heart. God simply gave the occasion for the hardening of his heart. Therefore the blame can be placed on Pharaoh.

Although Erasmus claims to take the literal meaning of the passage, Luther is outraged at this interpretation. Luther objects:

To put it in a word: the result of your exegetical license is that by your new, unheard-of grammar everything is thrown topsy-turvy. When God says: 'I will harden the heart of Pharaoh,' you change the persons, and take it thus: 'Pharaoh hardens himself by my long-suffering'! 'God hardens our hearts' means: 'we harden ourselves while God postpones punishment.'

Showing the absurdity of what Erasmus says, Luther says that this view means that God shows mercy when He sends Israel into captivity because then they are invited to repent; but when Israel is brought back from captivity, He hardens them by giving them the opportunity of hardening in His longsuffering. This is "topsy-turvy."

Positively, Luther explains this hardening of the heart of Pharaoh. God does this, therefore Pharaoh's heart is necessarily hardened. But God does not do something which is opposed to the nature of Pharaoh. Pharoah is enslaved to sin. When he hears the word of God through Moses which irritates his evil will, Pharaoh's heart is hardened. Luther explains it this way:

As soon as God presents to it from without something that naturally irritates and offends it, Pharaoh cannot escape the acting of the divine omnipotence and the perversion and villainy of his own will. So God's hardening of Pharaoh is wrought thus: God presents from without to his villainous heart that which by nature he hates. At the same time, He continues by omnipotent action to move within him the evil will which He finds there. Pharaoh by reason of the villainy of his will, cannot but hate what opposes him, and trust to his own strength; and he grows so obstinate that he will not listen nor reflect, but is swept along in the grip of Satan like a raging madman.

In his consideration of Jacob and Esau in Romans 9, Erasmus denies that this passage speaks of predestination. Erasmus says God does not hate anybody from eternity. But God's wrath and fury against sin are revealed on Esau because He knows the sins he will commit. In this connection, when Romans 9 speaks of God as the potter making a vessel of honor and dishonor, Erasmus says that God does this because of their belief and unbelief. Erasmus is trying to deny the necessity of the fulfillment of God's decree in order to support the freedom of the will.

Once again, Luther objects. Luther defends the necessity of consequence to what God decrees. Luther says, "If God foreknows a thing, it necessarily takes place." Therefore, in regard to Jacob and Esau, they did not attain their positions by their own free-will. Romans 9 emphasizes that they were not yet born and that they had not yet done good or evil. Without any works of obedience or disobedience, the one was master and the other was the servant. Jacob was rewarded not on the basis of anything he had done. Jacob was loved and Esau was hated even before the world began. Jacob loved God because God loved him. Therefore the source of salvation is not the free-will of man, but God's eternal decree. Paul is not the great champion of the freedom of the will.

In defense of the literal meaning of Romans 9:21-23, Luther shows that these verses oppose free-will as well. Luther examines the passage in the context of what Paul is saying. The emphasis in the earlier verses is not man, but what God does. He is sovereign in salvation. Here also, the emphasis is the potter. God is sovereign, almighty, and free. Man is enslaved to sin and acts out of necessity according to all God decrees. Luther shows that this is the emphasis of Romans 9 with sound exegetical work.

After refuting the texts to which Erasmus refers, Luther continues to show that Scripture denies the freedom of the will and teaches the sovereignty of God in salvation. He begins with Romans 1:18 which says, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness." Luther says this means all men are ungodly and are unrighteous. Therefore, all deserve the wrath of God. The best a man can do is evil. Referring to Romans 3:9, Luther proves the same thing. Both Jews and Greeks are all under sin. They will and do nothing but evil. Man has no power to seek after good because there is none that doeth good (Ps. 14:3). Therefore, men are "ignorant of and despise God! Here is unbelief, disobedience, sacrilege, blasphemy towards God, cruelty and mercilessness towards one's neighbors and love of self in all things of God and man." Luther's conclusion to the matter is this: man is enslaved to sin.

Man cannot obtain salvation by his works. Romans 3:20 says that by the works of the law no man can be justified in God's sight. It is impossible for a man to merit salvation by his works. Salvation must be the sovereign work of God.

Luther thunders against free-will in connection with Romans 3:21-16 which proclaims salvation by grace alone through faith.58 Free-will is opposed to faith. These are two different ways of salvation. Luther shows that a man cannot be saved by his works, therefore it must be by faith in Jesus Christ. Justification is free, of grace, and without works because man possesses no worthiness for it.

Finally, we notice that Luther points out the comprehensive terms of the apostle Paul to show that there is no free-will in man. All are sinners. There is none that is righteous, and none that doeth good. Paul uses many others also. Therefore, justification and salvation are without works and without the law.

Over against the idea of free-will stands the clear teaching of Scripture. Luther clearly exegetes God's Word to show this. In summary, the truth of predestination denies the free-will of man. Because salvation is by grace and faith, salvation is not by works. Faith and grace are of no avail if salvation is by the works of man. Also, the only thing the law works is wrath. The law displays the unworthiness, sinfulness, and guilt of man. As children of Adam we can do no good. Luther argues along these lines to show that a free-will does not exist in man. Salvation is by grace alone.

The Main Issues and Implications of Each View

Luther is not interested in abstract theological concepts. He does not take up this debate with Erasmus on a purely intellectual level. The main issue is salvation: how does God save? Luther himself defines the issue on which the debate hinges:

So it is not irreligious, idle, or superfluous, but in the highest degree wholesome and necessary, for a Christian to know whether or not his will has anything to do in matters pertaining to salvation…. This is the hinge on which our discussion turns, the crucial issue between us.

Luther finds it necessary to investigate from Scripture what ability the will of man has and how this is related to God and His grace. If one does not know this, he does not know Christianity. Luther brings this against Erasmus because he shows no interest in the truth regarding how it is that some are saved.

Although the broad issue of the debate is how God saves, the specific issue is the sovereignty of God in salvation. The main issue for Luther is that man does not have a free-will by which he merits eternal life, but God sovereignly saves those whom He has chosen.

Luther is pursuing the question, "Is God, God?" This means, is God the omnipotent who reigns over all and who sovereignly saves, or does He depend on man? If God depends on man for anything, then He is not God. Therefore Luther asks the question of himself: Who will try to reform his life, believe, and love God? His answer, "Nobody." No man can do this of himself. He needs God. "The elect, who fear God, will be reformed by the Holy Spirit; the rest will perish unreformed." Luther defends this truth so vigorously because it is the heart of the gospel. God is the sovereign God of salvation. If salvation depends on the works of man, he cannot be saved.

Certain implications necessarily follow from the views of salvation defended by both men. First, we must consider the implications which show the falsehood of Erasmus' view of salvation.

When Erasmus speaks of merit, he is really speaking as a Pelagian. This was offensive to Erasmus because he specifically claimed that he was not a Pelagian. But Luther rightly points out that Erasmus says man merits salvation. According to the idea of merit, man performs an act separate from God, which act is the basis of salvation. He deserves a reward. This is opposed to grace. Therefore, if merit is at all involved, man saves himself. This makes Erasmus no different from the Pelagians except that the Pelagians are honest. Pelagians honestly confess that man merits eternal life. Erasmus tries to give the appearance that he is against the Pelagians although he really is a Pelagian. Packer and Johnston make this analysis:

Erasmus had supposed that by stressing the smallness of the power which man can exercise, and of the merit which he can gain in his own strength, he was softening the offence of his Pelagian principles and moving closer to the Augustinian position, which denies all merit and ascribes salvation wholly to God.

According to Luther, Erasmus does not succeed in moving closer to the Augustinian position. Instead, he cheapens the purchase of God's grace. Luther says:

This hypocrisy of theirs results in their valuing and seeking to purchase the grace of God at a much cheaper rate than the Pelagians. The latter assert that it is not by a feeble something within us that we obtain grace, but by efforts and works that are complete, entire, perfect, many and mighty; but our friends here tell us that it is by something very small, almost nothing, that we merit grace.

The Pelagians base salvation upon works; men work for their own righteousness. But Erasmus has cheapened the price which must be paid for salvation. Because only a small work of man is needed to merit salvation, God is not so great and mighty. Man only needs to choose God and choose the good. God's character is tarnished with the teaching of Erasmus. This semi-Pelagianism is worse than Pelagianism, for little is required to earn salvation. As Packer and Johnston say, "that is to belittle salvation and to insult God."

Another implication of the synergistic view of salvation held to by Erasmus is that God is not God. Because salvation depends upon the free-will of man according to Erasmus, man ascribes divinity to himself. God is not God because He depends upon man. Man himself determines whether or not he will be saved. Therefore the study of soteriology is not the study of what God does in salvation, but soteriology is a study of what man does with God to deserve eternal life.

This means God's grace is not irresistible, but man can reject the grace of God. Man then has more power than God. God watches passively to see what man will do.

Finally, a serious implication of the view of Erasmus is that he denies salvation is found in Jesus Christ alone. In his Diatribe, Erasmus rarely mentions Jesus Christ. This shows something is wrong. This does follow from what Erasmus says. The emphasis for Erasmus is what man must do to be saved and not on what God has done in Jesus Christ. Therefore Jesus Christ is not the only way of salvation and is not that important.

Over against the implications of Erasmus' view are the orthodox implications of Luther's view. God is sovereign in salvation. God elects His people, He sent Jesus Christ, and reveals Jesus Christ only to His people. It is God who turns the enslaved wills of His people so that they seek after Him. Salvation does not depend upon the work of man in any sense.

The basis of salvation is Jesus Christ alone. Because man is enslaved to sin, He must be turned from that sin. He must be saved from that sin through the satisfaction of the justice of God. A man needs the work of Jesus Christ on the cross to be saved. A man needs the new life of Jesus Christ in order to inherit eternal life. The merits of man do not save because he merits nothing with God. A man needs the merits of Jesus Christ for eternal life. A man needs faith by which he is united to Christ.

The source of this salvation is election. God saves only those whom He elects. Those who receive that new life of Christ are those whom God has chosen. God is sovereign in salvation.

Because God is sovereign in salvation, His grace cannot be resisted. Erasmus says that the reason some do not believe is because they reject the grace which God has given to them. Luther implies that God does not show grace to all men. Instead, He saves and shows favor only to those who are His children. In them, God of necessity, efficaciously accomplishes His purpose.

Because man cannot merit eternal life, saving faith is not a work of man by which he merits anything with God. Works do not justify a man. Salvation is the work of God alone in Jesus Christ and through the Holy Spirit. Faith is a gift of God whereby we are united to Jesus Christ and receive the new life found in Him. Even the knowledge and confidence as the activity of faith are the gifts of faith.

Finally, only with this view of salvation that God is sovereign can a man have comfort that he will be saved. Because God is sovereign in salvation and because His counsel is immutable, we cannot fall from the grace of God. He preserves those who are His children. Erasmus could not have this comfort because he held that man determines his own salvation.

The Importance of This Controversy Today

Although this controversy happened almost five hundred years ago, it is significant for the church today. The error of "semi-Pelagianism" is still alive in the church today. Much of the church world sides with Erasmus today, even among those who claim to be "Reformed." If a "Reformed" or Lutheran church denies what Luther says and sides with Erasmus, they despise the reformation of the church in the sixteenth century. They might as well go back to the Roman Catholic Church.

This controversy is important today because many deny that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation. A man can worship heathen gods and be saved. This follows from making works the basis of salvation. Over against this error, Martin Luther proclaimed the sovereignty of God in salvation. He proclaimed Jesus Christ as the only way of salvation. We must do the same.

The error of Pelagianism attacks the church in many different forms. We have seen that in the history of the Protestant Reformed Churches. The sovereignty of God in salvation has been attacked by the errors of common grace and a conditional covenant. Over against these errors, some in the church world have remained steadfast by the grace of God. God does not love all. Nor does He show favor to all men in the preaching of gospel. Erasmus himself said that God showed grace to all men and God does not hate any man. The Arminians said the same thing at the time of the Synod of Dordt. Yet, men who defend common grace claim to be Reformed. They are not.

Also, in this synergistic view of salvation, we see the principles of the bilateral, conditional covenant view which is in many "Reformed" churches. If God and man work together in salvation, then the covenant must be a pact in which both God and man must hold up each one's end of the agreement. Over against this we must proclaim the sovereignty of God in salvation especially in regard to the covenant. The covenant is not conditional and bilateral. God works unconditionally and unilaterally in the covenant of grace.

Finally, we must apply the truth of the sovereignty of God defended by Luther to ourselves. We could say there is a Pelagian in all of us. We know God sovereignly saves, but we often show by our practice that we proudly want to sneak a few of our works in the back door. We must depend upon God for all things.

May this truth which Martin Luther defended, the truth of the sovereignty of God in salvation, be preserved in the church.

[Forest Keeper]

Clearly, the Word of God is NOT Scripture alone. The Scripture is only part of the Word given to man. The Bible ITSELF says this in John's Gospel, for heaven's sake! The WORD of God is a person!!!

Just as clearly, this is a point on which we will never agree. If, as you say, God gave other of His word only to your Church, then it would be equal with scripture. When two equals apparently disagree, an interpretation is needed. The men of the Church could have let God interpret His own word in the Bible, but we all know they made a very different choice. Therefore, the Bible doesn't mean what it says it means, rather, it means what the Church says it means. That is the reason why I have been saying that the Church puts itself ahead of the Bible. The Church believes it is equal to the Bible and solely controls what the Bible means. ... At least in my Bible, when the word "Word" is used to signify Jesus, it is capitalized, when it is used to denote scripture, it is not.

You are pushing forward the idea of Relativism, that every religion, every concept of God, is as good as another.

I have never said anything like that. I have been accused of it, but I've never said it.

[What Sola Scriptura means:] That everything that Christians are to believe is found in the Bible alone. Where does the Bible give us this rule?

Here are a few supporting verses:

1 Cor. 4:6 : Now, brothers, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, "Do not go beyond what is written."

Luke 1:1-4 : 1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. Paul first examines oral tradition, and then false writings. He concludes that to be SURE, he must write these things down.

2 Tim. 3:16-17 : 16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Notice that it says EVERY GOOD WORK. It does not say that man is prepared for MOST good works. Neither does it say that man is PARTIALLY prepared for every good work.

Your accusations that Catholics twist Scripture is tiring, from where we stand, since we see you do it all the time. For example, Sola Scriptura - which is nowhere in the Bible. This makes it a self-refuting rule.

Oh, come on! You accuse me and my side to every degree you take it. Any view that does not match yours is a twisting of the scripture. You can't deny you argue that. Just above, I gave three examples of support for Sola Scriptura. I could have given more. A nickel says you brush them all aside as a twisting of the scripture.

You came to these conclusions yourself by reading the Bible without ANYONE telling you about Altar Call or Sinner's Prayer? Come on! I am willing to bet that you were open to someone's theology, which you accepted gullibly without hardly cracking the Bible open. They pointed you to a few memorized verses taken out of context, and the rest is history.

I didn't know what an Altar Call was until I became a Southern Baptist, 8 YEARS after saying the sinner's prayer. Of course I learned the basics of Christianity before I said the sinner's prayer. But there was no deep theology attached to what I was taught. I learned it at an interdenominational Bible study. One of the lead teachers was a CATHOLIC!!! Reading of scripture was encouraged. It was for seekers, so no one got into any of the things we are talking about here. It happened to be a Lutheran who told me what the sinner's prayer was, but she was 17 too. She had no knowledge of any of this stuff.

Yes, I did have a one-on-one Bible study at my SB church, but it had nothing to do with my sinner's prayer, and the names of Luther or Calvin never came up once. Of course I had to come to my beliefs by considering the work of others, and how it matched what the scripture says. I never said any differently. Otherwise, I WOULD have just made it up myself. I DID come to the belief that the scripture has to be true without the help of any other people.

The Tradition came before the Bible, friend. This is common knowledge except to some Protestants.

I know there were lots of "traditional" teachings floating around, but it took a popular vote among men to decide which were heretical and which were of the Catholic Church. You have said yourself that any individual Father was perfectly capable of writing down error. It took a vote to sift through it all. Since the voters were also fallible men, I have no confidence that the correct result was reached in each and every single case.

If science leads me to think that the world was created billions of years ago, I am free to believe it without denying the inerrancy of Scriptures. You, on the other hand, MUST believe everything literally in such situations, since you consider the Bible as an idol to be worshipped and that God wouldn't inspire the Bible in an allegorical sense unless He sent a memo to you.

My, my, how little you understand us. I happen to hold the view that without evidence to the contrary, that I should take the accounts of the Bible at face value. I DID reach that conclusion without knowing or hearing any theology about it, other than the Bible is God's inerrant word. I truly have no idea if that makes me a good Calvinist or not. I wouldn't care if it didn't because I know I would not be abandoned by my side for saying so.

I think that your accusing me of idol worship is pretty hilarious given the circumstances. ... When God decided to use allegory in the Bible He did send me a memo. It was in the form of other scripture.

Scriptures do not lie, but sometimes, we misinterpret them.

Yes, I fully agree.

The Scriptures point to the earth as resting on pillars. Is. 40 says nothing about the earth being round on a three dimensional plane, but a circle on a two-dimensional plane - the sky being a canopy in three dimensions...

I guess it shouldn't surprise me that you are pro-actively interpreting AGAINST the scripture matching science. You go ahead and believe that the "pillar" verses were meant to be taken to mean that posts were actually supporting the earth physically. BTW, which tradition is being protected by interpreting the Bible to be filled with scientific errors?

[kosta50]

Note: Agrarian commented to #5318, specifically, these two statements:

Kosta: Again, the Church did not compile the New Testament so that the Reformed may discover the "true" church 15,000 [should have been 1,500] years later, but because of some 200 false Gnostic "gospels" launched by Satan and his demons

FK: So it was the Church that decided to create the New Testament, and it was because of the Gnostics? Seeing as how you don't mention God at all in the creation of the NT, I guess we really have the Gnostics to thank for its creation. How did the Church get God to agree to inspire the Church's word?

Agrarian: I do not believe that there is any hard evidence that even the earliest Gnostic "gospels" (those of "Peter" and "Thomas") predated the canonical Gospels -- or at least the first three. There is furthermore no evidence in Christian tradition or really any internal evidence that the writing of those first three Gospels happened as a reaction to the writing of Gnostic gospels

Regrettably, the whole thing is taken out of context and twisted. Firt of all, I stated that the Church decided to "compile the New Testament..." for such and such a reason, to which FK suggests I said that the Church "decided to create the New Testament..." and Agrarian simply dismissed the New Testament and referred only to the four Gospels instead!

Wow! Compile, means to gather, to collect in an ordely fashion something that already exists. That is how I used the word. To FK (unintentionally I am sure), complile became "create" -- as in write, make something new which is a complete corruption of my statement, as was Agrarian's (likewise unintentional, I am sure) reference to only four Gospels.

The New Testament consists of 27 books, including the four Gospels, so to take my statement "to compile the New Testament" and twist it to mean to write only four Gospels is simply amazing -- and puzzling. There is also a genuine confusion as to what I was referring to with respect to Gnosticism, as well as some lack of understanding of the historical sequence of events that resulted in the book we now call the New Testament.

As for Elaine Pagles and her satanic group favoring Gnosticism, the fact remains that Gnosticism predates Christianity and has incorporated Christian themes in a number of false and misleading "gospels" and "espistles," staring in the latter half of the first century A.D. and peaking in the second secondy, when the Church, under +Ireanaeus launched a vigorous campaign to combat these ideas and make sure that none of the Gnostic writings find their way into Christianity.

All in all, there were some 200-plus "gospels" and "espitles" written and circulated at the end of the first and throughout the second century A.D. Many of them incorporated verses from the four Gospels and adopted the style and manner similar to, and confusing of genuine Christian texts such as 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2 and 3 John, the Revelation of John, etc.

Gnostic "gospels" of Thomas, of Judas (mentioned by name by +Ireanaeus and recently discovered), the "gospel" of Peter (seen as supportive of docetism), the, "gospel" of the Hebrews, the "gospel" of Philip, the secret "gospel" of Mark, the Apocalypse of Peter, the "gospel" of Mary Magdalene, etc. composed in the mid 1st to mid 2nd centuries A.D. circulated together with genuine Christian Gospels, and Epistles.

The picture was actually made more complicated, and the work of the Church that much more difficult, with the appearances of various other works which were acceptable to the Church for one reason or another, but were never incorporated with the canonical works -- such as the Gospel of James (2nd century), which introduced the theme of the perpetual virginity of Theotokos (Mother of God), and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, and the so-called "harmony gospels."

These various works were single books, actually, scrolls, which were carried from city to city and read liturgically. No one had all of them neatly packaged into one neat bundle with reference marks and alphabetical index. There simple was no such thing as the New Testament book; only individual scrolls, and no one could for sure know which were genuine and which were not.

When Gnosticism and other heresies began to pop up towards the end of the first and throughout the second century A.D., the Church, with +Ireanaeus at the helm, began exposing these false writings for what they were, and at the same time the Church started collectively examining each known scroll (200-plus) with utmost attention to every word and doing everything to determine the Apostolic authorship with certainty and separating those from the rest.

The one scroll that gave the Church great deal of difficulty was the Revelation of John -- it was not accepted as inspired for over 200 years.

It took the Church fathers, each individually reading and sifting through available scrolls, about three hundred years to separate the genuine inspired works (23 of them in addition to the four Gospels), and reject almost 200 of them. When the Church was sure that the accepted scrolls were works of Apostolic origin, the Church compiled them into what we now know as the New Testament, thereby finalizing the Christian canon officially in 397 A.D. (end of the fourth century of Christianity) at the Council of Carthage. Actually, the complete listing of the current 27 books was done 30 years earlier by +Athanasius, but the "official" birth of the New Testament as we know it had to wait the aforementioned Council, when all bishops consented.

Agrarian's comment that +Ignatius knew the Gospels is correct. The Gospels, at least three of them, were well known (and accepted as inspired) by the end of the first century. It is interesting that +Polycarp (born around 80 AD), who was a disciple of "John," and martyred at the age of 87, never quotes from the Gospel of John, indicating that he did not know of this work supposedly written by the Apostle at the very end of the 1st century.

It was the 3rd c. bishop Eusebius (the first Church historian) who launched the idea that +Polycarp was a disciple of the Apostle John, but he was known for some interesting statements which cast a lot of doubt on his objectivity as a historian.

The point of this lengthy exposé was to clarify whence came the New Testament and why, and what role did God play in the creation of individual scrolls as opposed to what role the men of the Church played in collecting them into what all Christians including Protestants accept as part of the Bible. To say that the New Testament is simply something given to us by God, or to imply that the Church had nothing to do with it is false and misleading.

The most important point of all this is that the knowledge of what is genuine faith prior to having complete selection of canonical books had to be based on Church Tradition, based on oral and written Apostolic teachings for centuries before the New Testament saw the light of the day, and that the Church fathers were ultimately responsible for selectiong and compiling of the New Testament inspired writings.

Thus, I never implied nor stated that the genuine inspired works contained in the Christian Canon were written specifically to combat Gnosticism! I stated and do state that the process of compilation of genuine inspored works into what we know as the New Testament was driven by the existence of false and dangerous forgeries of faith, mostly Gnostic in origin, because there was no sure way of knowing which scrolls were liturgically true and which were nort.

The canonical books of the New Testament were written because they were inspired by God. However, these works found themselves surrounded by Gnostic works masquerading as "gospels" and "espistles." In response, the Church undertook a herculean task of separating Gnostic works from genuine inspired works in order to prevent corruption of faith, and decided to compile them into one body so that no other works would be read liturgically, and that all Christians would know which works are genuine and which are not.

I would like to ask those who comment on my posts to read each and every word of mine as to the meaning and to respond to that meaning and not to "extrapolate" other meanings.

If unsure as to why I am saying something that may seem hyperbolic or odd, I ask you to ask for an explanation before jumping to all sorts of conclusions. Sometimes out of eopcnomy and perhaps common knowledge, we resort to brevity, and make summary statements, because the body of knowledge behind it is simply too voluminous to post each and every time.

[Bohemund]

Let's examine the support you cited to support the Reformation invention of sola scriptura:

1 Cor. 4:6 : Now, brothers, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, "Do not go beyond what is written."

First, 1 Corinthians was probably written around 57 AD. As a result, it predates almost every other book in the New Testament, and certainly all of the gospels. To take Paul's comment out of context and literally, as you do, nothing written after First Corinthians is to be trusted. After all, the books written after First Corinthians--that is, the whole New Testament, give or take some epistles--"go beyond what [was] written" in First Corinthians.

Further, the admonition not to go beyond what is written is a literal translation of what was apparently a common saying of the time, roughly equivalent to "don't get too big for your britches." Read some commentaries on it.

Luke 1:1-4 : 1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.

Paul first examines oral tradition, and then false writings. He concludes that to be SURE, he must write these things down.

You are conflating two passages, one from Paul, and a much later one from Luke. The introductory passage from Luke presupposes the existence of other narratives. The plethora of noncanonical gospels shows us that merely writing something down was not enough. As Luke says, the true traditions "were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word." So, the introduction of Luke shows us how Holy Tradition preceded the New Testament and inspired its writing, and neatly illuminates the logic behind apostolic succession.

2 Tim. 3:16-17 : 16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Notice that it says EVERY GOOD WORK. It does not say that man is prepared for MOST good works. Neither does it say that man is PARTIALLY prepared for every good work.

Paul had to have written Second Timothy before his death in 67. This means that 2 Tim. far predates the gospels and the Book of Revelation, among other parts of the New Testament. So we know that Paul, when talking about "Scripture" being God-inspired he was not talking about the New Testament as we know it.

The lines preceding your quote are:

But you, remain faithful to what you have learned and believed, because you know from whom you learned it, and that from infancy you have known (the) sacred scriptures, which are capable of giving you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 2 Tim. 3:14-15.

If Paul was writing to adults, what sacred scripture would they have known "from infancy?" Not the Pauline epistles, which were not written until the 50's. Not the Gospels, which were not written until the 60's (at the earliest). He must have been talking about the Old Testament. Finally, 2 Tim. 14 makes reference to what the recipients of the letter "have learned and believed," because they know from whom" they learned it. No reference to scripture here. Instead, it is a reference to Holy Tradition and, perhaps, apostolic succession.

[Agrarian]

Kosta is correct that he stated "compile," and I apologize for the misunderstanding of what he and jo kus had been saying.

The specific post contained this statement, and I suspect that it was this statement that both FK and I responded to:

"That means that the Patriarch of Antioch, St. Ignatius, who was made bishop by none other than St. Peter in person, knew what we now read in the Bible by learning it from the mouth of St. Peter and not reading it in the "Bible" mainly because the only Bible in those days was the Old Testament. The New Testament did not see the light of the day for another three hundred years."

Since not even the canon of the OT had been codified within either Judaism or Christianity at the time of St. Ignatius, I assumed that this statement meant that the texts of the books we refer to as the OT existed, but that the texts of what we now call the NT did not exist until much later and that St. Ignatius therefore didn't have access to the NT texts. This is a pretty common belief amongst modern scholarship, so I can, I hope, be forgiven for missing the distinction in this particular case.

My emphasis on the 4 Gospels was due to the fact that St. John's Gospel does have some anti-Gnostic qualities, and due to the fact that the most prominent Gnostic writings were "Gospels."

I agree, of course, completely that the process of compiling the canon of the NT was the work of the Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, just as the work of writing the individual books was the work of individual men -- also with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. And of course the preservation of those texts and that canon was the work of the Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

I would point out for the sake of our Protestant brethren that the process of selecting a canon was not solely based on a need to differentiate between canonical and heretical works.

There are works still considered to be valuable and non-heretical writings that were considered at one time or place or another to be Scriptural: the Shepherd of Hermas, the Epistle of Barnabas, the (1st) Epistle of Clement, the canons of the Apostles, etc...

So the fact that a particular work was not included in the NT canon does not necessarily mean that the Church considered it to be heretical -- although most rejected works were, as Kosta notes, quite simply heretical frauds.

Likewise, the fact that the Apocalypse and a number of the general epistles were excluded from various lists does not mean that anyone of the Church of that time considered them to be heretical -- they were simply exercising caution in making certain that they were embracing only works of genuinely Apostolic origin, of inspiration by the Holy Spirit, and with no doctrinal errors.

Interestingly, it took the Protestant Reformation for a serious reconsideration of the canon of Scripture to take place. As well as rejecting the "deuterocanonical" works, there is the famous labeling of the Epistle of St. James by Martin Luther as "the epistle of straw," and his disparaging attitude toward Hebrews, Jude and Revelation -- not to mention his relative "downgrading" of the importance of the Gospels of Sts. Matthew, Mark, and Luke...

[Agrarian]

As a coda to my final paragraph above, I must in fairness say that Luther and the Reformers never actually excised any of the NT books. It was in Luther's comments about the Scriptures that his opinions are known.

In setting up a sort of hierarchy within the Scriptures, Luther wasn't really doing anything that the Church hadn't already done to some extent. What he did, though, was to reject the traditional hierarchy in favor of one of his own preference. He liked the Gospel of John and certain Pauline epistles best.

What bothered Luther were the perceived contradictions within Scripture -- since the Epistle of St. James seemed to contradict St. Paul, then the Epistle of St. James must be of doubtful origin or lesser authority. He seems to have fallen prey to the idea that if Scripture seems to contradict itself, then part of it must not really be truly Scripture.

The Calvinist tradition tends to like the Pauline epistles and the Old Testament the best -- its own "practical hierarchy" within Scripture.

[Agrarian]

"What was there from the very beginning? Did the Apostles have "faith" in the exact details as expressed by the ecumenical councils? That would be pressing pretty hard, wouldn't it?"

No, it would hardly be pressing it hard at all. I don't think that any Orthodox Christian would have any doubt that were the Apostles to have been faced with Nestorianism, Arianism, or Monophysitism, that they would have rejected them, and in response articulated essentially what the Ecumenical Councils did in their response.

"Did they have an implicit and intuitive faith but not as detailed as expressed in the creeds? That would seem more likely, would'nt it?"

Yes, that is exactly what I believe I stated when I disagreed with the idea that "a belief articulated with precision for the first time is a belief that has only newly sprung into being."

"If you want to press that the Apostles had the exact same knowledge as expressed by the creeds then Kosta's pushing the envelope that the OT patriarchs and prophets possessed a different faith is logically consistent with that prior proposition."

Kosta will have to explain and defend what he means with regard to the OT patriarchs and prophets. My understanding of the Church's teaching in that regard is of a piece with what I said about the Apostles. In the case of the Patriarchs and Prophets, the teaching of the Church seems clear that while they probably held such beliefs only "implicitly and intuitively" to use your terminology, they would indeed have recognized Christ as the Messiah and acknowledged him as God.

This is really not just a theoretical proposition, either. St. John the Baptist was the last of the OT prophets, and he recognized Christ. The Apostle Nathaniel "a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile" recognized Christ. On Mount Tabor, Moses and Elijah appeared with Christ, and spoke to him concerning his coming passion. They clearly recognized Christ as being God, and in their persons, all of the law and prophets were encapsulated.

And within Orthodox theology, they specifically did have the chance to encounter Christ in Hades and recognize him as God -- and they did. It is inconsistent with Orthodox teaching in general about the afterlife to believe that the Prophets and Patriarchs would have responded to Christ differently in Hades than they would have had they encountered him on earth while they were alive. There are few OT references to the Messiah as God, but they are there, and I believe that they reflect an "implicit and intuitive" understanding of devout Hebrews prior to the time of Christ.

I believe that it was St. Augustine who said something to the effect that the New Testament is within the Old Testament concealed -- and that the Old Testament is in the New Testament revealed.

"I really don't see the need to compress all knowledge into one historical situatedness. It seemed implicit in your posts that you seem to believe that the knowledge of the OT patriarchs and prophets was not an exhaustive knowledge of the exact persons and events to come but enough of a implicit faith and so then the question becomes why then would knowledge end?"

I'm not sure what your question means, or what exactly you are asking. Perhaps at root is the question of what constitutes knowledge. In one sense, there is no-one with a greater knowledge of Christ than those of the Apostolic era -- they walked and talked with God in the flesh, and they were there for the great outpourings of the Holy Spirit. Their knowledge of Christ can hardly be exceeded -- certainly at the heart of our reverence for the Theotokos was that she, bearing God in her womb, knew God more intimately than anyone else before or since possibly could. They set a standard for knowing Christ, and it is for that reason that New Testament Scripture is restricted to writings of Apostolic origin.

Articulation of theological formulations is not the same thing as knowledge. One can mouth precise statements of dogmatic truth and not know God at all. No-one is claiming that the Apostles were going around in the 1st century preaching the specific terminology of Ephesus or Chalcedon or the Cappadocian Fathers. We are saying, though, that the body of faith was intact from the beginning because the knowledge of Christ was intact from the beginning.

"Again, your terminology tries to force faith and knowledge as exactly the same thing. The Reformation faith is "exactly" like the Apostles faith in the substitutionary atonement of Christ. However, our "formulations" are more precise because knowledge is not static. To deny the Church grows in understanding is to deny the sovereignty of the Holy Spirit to "blow where he may". Faith seeking understanding. Nothing wrong with that, is there?"

No, I'm afraid that it was you who were forcing faith and knowledge into being the same thing, when you asked Kosta the rhetorical question about whether the Apostles held the faith of the Ecumenical Councils. Your own implied answer was that they did not. The only possible explanation for such an answer would be that since the Ecumenical Councils used specific doctrinal definitions, terminology, and formulations for the first time, that the Apostles couldn't possibly have held the same beliefs as the Orthodox Church of, say, the 4th or the 8th century.

My point was that if you are going to consider patristic teachings to be innovations on the basis that they are supposedly not Scriptural because they make use of certain philosophical terms that are not used in the Bible in exactly the same way, or not at all -- then one must certainly apply that same standard to the Reformers, who were pretty obvious creatures of their own time and philosophical milieu...

If you are going to accept the teachings of the Reformers in spite of the fact that their specific formulations are found neither in the Scriptures nor in the writings of the early Church -- then there is no rational reason to reject the writings of the Fathers whose faith stands directly in the line of our Orthodox tradition.

What the Orthodox Church essentially teaches is that the Apostles passed on their faith, their body of knowledge, their understanding, and their praxis to their followers, and they passed it on to subsequent generations without interruption. In response to heresies and challenges and through the working of the Holy Spirit, all of this became more precisely developed -- without changing. The combination of that preservation of the deposit of the faith and the action of the Holy Spirit yields the very "precise" (to use your term) beliefs and practices of the Orthodox Church today.

What Protestantism teaches is that the Apostles failed utterly in passing on the deposit of faith, since their bones were hardly cold in the grave before the faith began to be lost and perverted. According to this view, St. Augustine had some bits of understanding in spite of being part of a very lost Church but was a lonely island. Only in the 16th century did someone finally start to get it all right and put it all together correctly by reading properly for the first time the Greek texts of Scripture that had been passed down in the Orthodox Church...

The question that must be asked is which form of "growing with understanding" is a more likely path for the faith of the Apostles to take?

[Dr. Eckleburg]

To deny the Church grows in understanding is to deny the sovereignty of the Holy Spirit to "blow where he may". Faith seeking understanding. Nothing wrong with that, is there?

Amen.

I've always liked what Augustine wrote --

"First you believe; then you understand."

By His grace alone.

[Forest Keeper]

This is what I posted or referred to on this thread about the "brethren". Please point out where the "brethren" are interpreted by kinsfolk by DECLARATION.

I meant that the Church must declare all verses supporting the siblings of Jesus to be void. That is the only way to maintain the tradition of Mary's perpetual virginity, since it is found no where in scripture. The only evidence of any kind on the subject is that Mary did have other children, so those verses must be quashed for the good of the Church. If your answer is that tradition preceded the scripture, then my response is that therefore, tradition supersedes scripture in the case of disagreements like this between tradition and scripture. If you say there is no disagreement, then that proves my statement.

I refuse to accept that each and every Biblical Christian scholar in the history of mankind understood none of the ancient languages, nor could any of them interpret Biblical ideas to save his/her life. That is, except of course, for all the Catholic ones. That is the clear message I have gotten on this thread.

In 2982 I referred you to this post by InterestedQuestioner: ...

Yes, you certainly did, and I responded in 3039 that I had read it, thought it sounded reasonable, and had some comments and questions. I also made a case for my point of view on this. Nobody owes me anything, so I do not at all feel slighted that I got no responses, but I do want it on the record that I did read it and responded.

FK: "I asked someone (or several) that if your interpretation was correct, then how did people refer to their actual blood siblings."

I don't know factually, they probably used the same word "adelphos" as they do today, and if greater precision were necessary they would say "direct brother" or something.

But as I admitted, the Bible does sometimes use the word "brother" to mean a blood sibling. Why would you have to guess? Since I have sworn off looking up Greek on this thread due to experience, what word do they use in passages like Matt. 4:18-22?

If it is the same word, then you are saying that at the time, there was absolutely no concept whatsoever of special brotherly love between blood siblings. How could there be if you would tell a stranger that the two people over in the corner were both your brothers, when one was your third cousin twice removed, and the other was your blood sibling? I can't buy it. I know of no civilization that put so little importance on the nuclear family, and close blood ties. You are asking me to believe it meant nothing to anyone of that time.

FK: "I have no Biblical reason to trust [the Church fathers] over and above the Bible."

This is funny. Actually, you do have a biblical reason, 2 Thessalonians 2:14, in particular, ...

I don't see how that verse says I should trust the Church over and above scripture, as you suggest. Paul says to follow everything he taught them both orally and in writing. I don't believe Paul would have contradicted himself, which is why I don't think the oral teaching survived as well as the written one did.

If for some reason all the Bibles physically vanished or became linguistically incomprehensible through the passage of time and semantic drifts, the Word would still be the same and Christianity would still be the same.

Yes, the Word would be the same, but surely Christianity as practiced would not. The first Christians, the "best" ones, couldn't prevent the Gnostics and many other sects from cropping up even back then. Don't you think there would have been a geometric progression into further error without the scripture? I do. Look at the mess we're in today WITH the scripture. :)

[Forest Keeper]

FK: "The Tradition produced the NT?"

Yes.

Well, since then I've learned that you think of the scripture as part of Tradition. I see your view as being that if there were 10,000 stories to tell, the authors of the NT just decided to write some of them down, leave others out, and it didn't really matter because it would all be picked back up again through the Church. The scriptures are fine, as a supplement, but Tradition is really where the truth rests. After all, it was first. If anyone ever thinks that the scripture does not match Tradition, then in every single case it is the person misinterpreting scripture, not misinterpreting Tradition.

If God "wrote" the Bible, how could their personalities come through unless they added a little of their own "zest" to the text? ... the scribes' personalities somehow "snuck" in?

Their personalities didn't come through because of them, but because God wanted it that way. There was no sneakery involved. It was all God's will. There could be a dozen reasons for this. Just speculating, one could have been to authenticate the letters from the Biblical writer. Paul visited places and then wrote letters. If they didn't sound anything like him, then that would not have been productive.

A similar idea could have worked for the Gospel authors, the people heard the oral teaching first and then read the written word. If they did not match both in content and in style, then that would have been a red flag for new believers. In any event, I am merely observing what appears to be patently true in terms of the fact that personalities came through. I do not claim to declare the reason for it with certainty.

If what St. Ignatius, a disciple of Apostle Peter, we are confident that his writings reflect the knowledge of the Church and St. Peter himself, for otherwise I doubt he would have made him a bishop and patriarch of Antioch and his spiritual successor.

I honestly am not sure what the missing words are, but I think my answer would be that you have thrown out many teachings of the early Fathers, most notably, Augustine. (Wikipedia even says that Tertullian questioned that Mary was a perpetual virgin, but I don't quote that source as gospel. :) How do you know which of the works of these heralded Saints is true and which is bogus. My understanding is that other fallible men get together and have a vote on it. Those fallible men decide what God meant, and you are bound by it. Your confidence is based on fallible men.

So, you put yourself in the position of being the correct interpreter of the word of God!?

No, not in a million years. It only looks that way to you because I differ from the Church. So, when I see a verse that says "For it is by grace you are saved, through faith ...", and I interpret it to mean that we are saved by grace through faith, you would say that I am coming up with my own private (crazy) interpretation, because the Church strongly disagrees with this.

[jo kus]

I do not believe that there is any hard evidence that even the earliest Gnostic "gospels" (those of "Peter" and "Thomas") predated the canonical Gospels -- or at least the first three. There is furthermore no evidence in Christian tradition or really any internal evidence that the writing of those first three Gospels happened as a reaction to the writing of Gnostic gospels.

I think Kosta was referring to the Canonization of the NT Scriptures, not its original writing. There were a number of valuable writings that many local churches were content to read DURING the Liturgy that were later not accepted as part of the Canon. For example, the First Letter of Clement to the Corinthians was read by the Corinthian churches for over 150 years during the Mass. It was only later forces of Marcion and Gnosticism (opposing forces of contraction/expansion) that "forced" the Church to determine the contents of the Canon.

Regards

[kosta50]

I can say only this: St. John the Baptist did recognize Christ in flesh, and he was the only one. As for Moses and Elijah — on Mount Tabor, they had, shall we say, "inside information." All the people will recognize Christ after death.

Agrarian says that there are many OT references to Messiah as God. In most cases, when God is referred to as the "Savior" it relates to His brining Israel out of Egypt or physically saving Jewish people and cities from wrath. As a Redeemer, He is referred to in terms of having mercy on fickle Israel, but nothing even close to what Christ preached in the Gospels.

If there is a seamless connection between the two Testaments, showing one and the same faith, I leave it up to experts to demonstrate, which I have yet to see. We speak of Catholics having a different faith than the Orthodox, yet I would say our the Orthodox have more in common even with Calvinism than the New Testament has with the Old Testament.

Again, I hear over and over that the Judaism at the time when Christ walked on earth was "different" from the rabbinical post-Jamnia Judaism, yet I see no proof or specifics to defend such an assertion.

What we are asserting is that only those who followed Christ were real Jews, as we, followers of Christ, are "real" Israel. We also assert that all the Patriarchs believed exactly what we believe, yet their only problem with Israel was that the Jews kept reverting to worshiping idols.

If they had the same faith, why were the Patriarch and Prophets in Hell when Christ descended there? They were righteous, yet they were condemned!

Needless to say, there is an extraordinary amount of "stretching" that is required to make the two Testaments become "seamless."

[kosta50]

For example, the First Letter of Clement to the Corinthians was read by the Corinthian churches for over 150 years during the Mass. It was only later forces of Marcion and Gnosticism (opposing forces of contraction/expansion) that "forced" the Church to determine the contents of the Canon

You've go that right, brother. You understand what I was referring to but you said it better than I could.

[jo kus]

Just as clearly, this is a point on which we will never agree. If, as you say, God gave other of His word only to your Church, then it would be equal with scripture. When two equals apparently disagree, an interpretation is needed

I am merely relating what is common knowledge of the historical development of Christianity's spread throughout the world. God CHOSE not to give ANY NT writings to the first Christians! This is proof positive that Scripture does NOT determine what we believe, but it comes from the Apsotles themselves. THEY taught by word of mouth first, then by letter. NOWHERE does it say that the Bible now takes over. Thus, if you have problems with this line of thought, it seems to me that you are not following the Scriptures, the Word of God.

I agree that if something disagrees with Scripture, it is not valid Tradition. I don't find any Apostolic Tradition (a.k.a "orally" taught teachings that we still hold to) that disagree with the Bible that cannot be properly explained. IF something comes from God, it holds equal weight. Who cares if it is written or not?

I have never said anything like that. (Relativism) I have been accused of it, but I've never said it.

When you use yourself to interpret the Bible and the concept that any person can interpret themselves outside of the Church, then that is what you are saying, even though you don't use those words.

1 Cor. 4:6 : Now, brothers, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, "Do not go beyond what is written."

Your interpretation of this does not match the KJV, which gives a different take: "And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and [to] Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn in us not to think [of men] above that which is written, that no one of you be puffed up for one against another."

This verse doesn't say anything about "what is written" as being Scriptures! Even if Paul is refering to Scriptures, he is undoubtedly refering to the Old Testament, as the NT wasn't even written yet when the First Letter to the Corinthians was penned.

Luke 1:1-4 ...Paul first examines oral tradition, and then false writings. He concludes that to be SURE, he must write these things down.

I presume you mean Luke. Luke is trying to write down all of the various stories circulating about the Christ into one orderly account. Luke doesn't say anything about "false writings". He is merely trying to consolidate everything that was already known. It is unlikely that a person living in Athens would know EVERYTHING orally said about Christ, thus, a written account is better, all things equal. However, nothing here about Sola Scriptura!

We already talked about 2 Timothy. You need to try to stop reading what is plainly not there:

"the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

That does not say that something ELSE can equip someone for every good work. It merely says that "Scriptures" (which, funny enough, is NOT refering to the NT Scriptures, since Paul is refering to a set of writings that Timothy was familiar with during his CHILDHOOD! Thus, to take this as you do, then, you will have to discount the NT in your Sola Scriptura) are USEFUL for every good work. So is prayer. So is the Church, the community of faith.

"And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers, For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ" Eph 4:11-13

This clearly tells us that apostles, prophets, evangelists and so forth are for PERFECTING THE SAINTS...UNTO THE PERFECTING OF MEN... Nothing about Scriptures, although we can ASSUME that they would use the Bible as part of their preaching and teaching.

Clearly, the NT Bible never says anything about "itself" because it didn't exist yet! Thus, Sola Sciptura is a false teaching of men that leads people away from the Word of God as taught by the Apostles.

Any view that does not match yours is a twisting of the scripture.

Ditto. But I have the teaching of 2000 years of Church teachings, backed by the promise of the Holy Spirit who CANNOT lead us into error. You have yourself and the teachings of heretics to lead you. Frankly, I will stick with the Holy Spirit's promise to guide the Apostles to all truths and will follow their successors.

Your story of conversion verifies my point: We take on the teachings of those who teach us. You didn't read the Bible and come to conclusions yourself. We ALL deal with this to some degree. For Catholics, it is a matter of proving whether it (the Catholic Church) existed first and was established by the first generations of Christians. If so, it would be hard to argue against the Spirit's guidance of it, as it still exists, as Christ promised.

I know there were lots of "traditional" teachings floating around, but it took a popular vote among men to decide which were heretical and which were of the Catholic Church.

Popular vote? Then I suppose what happened in Acts 15 was a "popular vote", and not the Holy Spirit...This is a matter of belief - that the Spirit guides the Church. This belief is clearly found in Scriptures.

I happen to hold the view that without evidence to the contrary, that I should take the accounts of the Bible at face value

That is what we are taught, as well. And there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the earth is older than 6000 years, which, by the way, is a tradition of men, since the Bible doesn't mention what year the earth was formed. Thus, I am open to the scientific fact that the first three chapters of Genesis are more allegory than science. However, this does NOT take anything away from the Bible's inerrancy. Inerrancy means that God's Word is truth - in what HE wanted to say. Important distinction.

I think that your accusing me of idol worship is pretty hilarious given the circumstances. ... When God decided to use allegory in the Bible He did send me a memo. It was in the form of other scripture.

Say what?

I guess it shouldn't surprise me that you are pro-actively interpreting AGAINST the scripture matching science. You go ahead and believe that the "pillar" verses were meant to be taken to mean that posts were actually supporting the earth physically. BTW, which tradition is being protected by interpreting the Bible to be filled with scientific errors?

Now don't get all upset! Frankly, I don't really CARE HOW the earth was formed - I know that God did it and why. That is what the Bible is clear on. The rest, the background, is a story that shows God's orderly thought and love behind making His creation. God is the creator of nature, as well as the Scriptures, and He cannot lie. Thus, He leaves tell-tale signs of the earth's age. He doesn't try to "trick" us into thinking that the earth is really old, like some "young earth" fundamentals claim. I trust that science has accurately told us that the earth is more than 6000 years old. Perhaps not 10 billion, but even one billion is a heck of a lot more than 6000 years.

Yes, science has been wrong before - but so has Biblical interpretation. Even Christians have been wrong on what the Bible is meant to say, such as on slavery. Thus, it is a farce to say that Genesis can ONLY be a literal history of the creation of the world.

I do not fear science. I don't need to pretend or desperately search for excuses as to why the earth is older than 6000 years. My faith is secure, even if the Bible has been misinterpreted on this section, which, by the way, many Church Fathers have ALSO looked at Genesis as allegory. St. Augustine wrote a book about it, and that was 400 AD, way before science knew the earth was round. Because Catholics do not hold Scripture INTERPRETATION of men as infallible in this case, I am free to decide, based on the evidence currently available, that the earth is older than 6000 years, not that that matters regarding my faith in Christ. Nor is my idea of Scriptural inerrancy destroyed. Man's interpretations of Scripture outside the Church are fallible.

Regards

[kosta50]

I meant that the Church must declare all verses supporting the siblings of Jesus to be void

FK, I come from a culture that is close to the region and I know that people in Mediterranean cultures refer to their first cousins as "brothers." or "sisters." Thus my first cousin is my "sister" (by aunt). The reason for this is obvious: it prevented intermarriage between first or even second cousins.

The custom is actually alien in the west, especially modern west. Thus, to you Jesus' brothers are His "siblings" because that's the reality of your culture which forces you to interpret the Scripture in this way.

However, in all fairness to the Protestants, the New Testament does say that +Joseph did not "know" Mary until after she gave birth to Jesus (Mat 1:24-25). The term "to know" a woman in the Bible is consistently used as a carnal relationship between a husband and wife (i.e. Gen 4:1).

Another example of interpreting Scripture literally comes from the way the Latter Day Saints (LDS), Mormons, "understand" Mary's conception. They say the words the Bible uses is "overshadow" speaking of the Holy Spirit. This is indeed terminology used in the Bible to denote sexual intercourse, so the LDS simply conclude that Christ was conceived as a union between God and amortal!

We, and this includes your side of Christianity (I hope), sees Mary's conception as a supernatural event, the way we understand sacraments. And, in the same manner, we understand her Virgin Birth, having occurred without breaking her seal or being painful. But if you really want to be a stickler for straight biblical talk, then the Bible does suggest what the LDS seem to be believe (then, they also believe that God the Father used to be a man and that Satan is Jesus' "sibling"!).

[kosta50]

Well, since then I've learned that you think of the scripture as part of Tradition

Actually, FK, I know with utmost certainty that the New Testament (not all Scripture) is a result of the Holy Tradition.

I do understand that to you this may be as disappointing as it must have been to find out that Santa Klaus really did not exist or that in the real world he was a Saint, but that's what they call "growing pains."

In order for the New Testament to become compiled from existing writings the Church had to know what is orthodox and what is heretical. That knowledge did not exist in neatly packaged book called the New Testament.

The compilation of the New Testament served the purpose to eliminate any possibility of having heretical books used liturgically.

The fathers of the early Church had to be able to tell the difference between Gnostic lies that masqueraded as "gospels" from genuine Apostolic writings. They didn't have an instruction manual on how to tell the genuine from the false. The had to know.

Today, you know because you read the New Testament. But they didn't have one. They had many scrolls, hundreds of them in fact, that looked and sounded like "real" Gospels and Epistles, yet all but 27 of them turned out to be false.

That we have the New Testament today so you can than God who inspired the writers, and your "fallible men" of the Church who gathered the genuine books and compiled them into a book we know as the New Testament.

[kosta50]

Frankly, I don't really CARE HOW the earth was formed - I know that God did it and why. That is what the Bible is clear on...Thus, He leaves tell-tale signs of the earth's age. He doesn't try to "trick" us into thinking that the earth is really old...Yes, science has been wrong before - but so has Biblical interpretation. Even Christians have been wrong on what the Bible is meant to say, such as on slavery. Thus, it is a farce to say that Genesis can ONLY be a literal history of the creation of the world...I do not fear science. I don't need to pretend or desperately search for excuses as to why the earth is older than 6000 years. My faith is secure, even if the Bible has been misinterpreted on this section...

Beautifully stated, Jo.

[kosta50]

I think my answer would be that you have thrown out many teachings of the early Fathers, most notably, Augustine

St. Augustine is a Saint in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, so that would be absurd. The other day, they quoted St. Augustine during homily in my Orthodox church. What the Catholic and the Orthodox Churches do with St. Augustine is that not all of his writing is necessarily concensus patrum, which is the only "security measure" that guards against private, individualistic or relativistic corruptions.

But, speaking of discarding and distortions, it is really the Protestants who throw out all the other Saints as "bogus" and embraced only one, St. Augustine, and generally only Apostle Paul, and predominately the Old Testament.

Wikipedia even says that Tertullian questioned that Mary was a perpetual virgin, but I don't quote that source as gospel. :) How do you know which of the works of these heralded Saints is true and which is bogus

Tertullian is a perfect example of someone who used to be orthodox and then later on in life left the Church through heresy because he placed his personal beliefs and interpretations above the concensus patrum, which is another way of saying that he thought himself smarter than the rest of the bishops.

So, when I see a verse that says "For it is by grace you are saved, through faith ...", and I interpret it to mean that we are saved by grace through faith, you would say that I am coming up with my own private (crazy) interpretation, because the Church strongly disagrees with this

No, I would say that only because the Church does not say that. We read the same verse the same way as you do, except that your definition of being "saved" is something form the left field.

You also read Scripture that is not the Scripture of the Church but of man called Luther, and men called Calvinists. Your Scripture is not identical to ours, nor does it say the same thing and is not the same canon.

[Agrarian]

"Agrarian says that there are many OT references to Messiah as God."

Actually, whast I wrote was: "There are few OT references to the Messiah as God, but they are there..."

Given the fact that I misinterpreted or quoted Kosta, this is only fair game! :-)

The most prominent example that spring to mind is the quotation that Christ himself used to silence the Pharisees: "... the Lord said unto my Lord..." And there are several references to the universality of the Messiah's work, encompassing the Gentiles, making the Messiah at the very least more than a glorified Jewish warlord.

"As for Moses and Elijah — on Mount Tabor, they had, shall we say, "inside information." All the people will recognize Christ after death."

Yes, they will recognize him after death, but how will they respond to him? That is the real question in the Orthodox understanding of the afterlife. If Moses and the Prophets lived and died utterly convinced that God could not become man, and held a faith that was as incompatible with Christianity as was the official Judaism of Christ's day and after, then one could only assume that they would reject Christ after death as surely as they would have rejected him had they encountered him during life.

"Again, I hear over and over that the Judaism at the time when Christ walked on earth was "different" from the rabbinical post-Jamnia Judaism, yet I see no proof or specifics to defend such an assertion."

I, for one, have never asserted this. I believe that the official Judaism of Christ's day was just as misguided as was later rabbinical Judaism. I do not believe that the words and actions of the Pharisees reflected the faith of the Patriarchs and Prophets. I am in good company, since Christ himself told the Pharisees the same thing! :-)

My only contention is that there *were* Jews (perhaps reflecting a particular strain of Judaism) who quickly and readily recognized and embraced Christ, and came to recognize him as God. I will leave off the argument from hades, and reduce it to this: had the Patriarchs and Prophets been able to encounter Christ in life, would they have rejected him as did the Pharisees, or would they have embraced him as Lord and God?

If there really is a radical discontinuity between the faith of the Patriarchs and prophets and the faith of the Jews who embraced Christ as Lord and God, then the only possible answer is that Moses and Elijah, had they been around in life, would have been part of the lynching party. That is a legitimate position to hold, but would be one that I would find takes at least as much stretching as does the Church's traditional understanding...

"yet their only problem with Israel was that the Jews kept reverting to worshiping idols."

Yes, while Moses and the Prophets themselves encountered God at the level of theosis, the reality they were dealing with "on the ground" was on an entirely different level. The primary decision that the people were having to make was whether to worship the demons in form of idols, or to worship the one true God. There are thus reasons why the Pentateuch is dealing with some pretty basic issues compared to the lofty writings of the Apostle John.

The process of bringing the people of Israel to the point where they would produce the Theotokos was a long and hard one. This would perhaps explain at least in part why the type of Savior alluded to in OT times was primarily one expressed in terms they could most readily relate to at the time.

But, as St. Gregory Palamas said, the OT Patriarchs and Prophets achieved theosis (albeit in a necessarily temporary fashion), and directly encountered God. They would therefore, have recognized that same God were he to have become man in their time. One who reads what they wrote had the opportunity to have the same encounter, and this is why Christ insisted that the Jewish leadership of his day did not understand their own Scriptures. If they did, they would have recognized him.

"If they had the same faith, why were the Patriarch and Prophets in Hell when Christ descended there? They were righteous, yet they were condemned!"

They were in Hades -- the place of the dead (Sheol in Hebrew), which does not at all necessarily mean a place of torment and punishment. They were subject to death because death had not yet been conquered by Christ's resurrection. Even St. John the Baptist was in Hades, and he recognized Christ for who he was.

[jo kus]

FK: "...for the Gospel authors, the people heard the oral teaching first and then read the written word. If they did not match both in content and in style, then that would have been a red flag for new believers."

What is ironic about this response is that is EXACTLY how the Church determined which writings were not legitimately inspired by God. The Church had a body of teaching, an inner sense, of what was given to it - and after reading the Gospel of Mark, knew it was legitimate, as it matched what they had heard orally. The same is true regarding Gnostic Gospels and writings. They recognized that this Gospel was NOT in tune with the Tradition given, both orally and written. Thus, the FIRST teachings are used as our foundation, our basis for judging whether something given later (written letters) are legitimately from Paul, or are forgeries, or are from an un-orthodox Christian.

It only looks that way to you because I differ from the Church

What is the pillar and foundation of the truth, the Bible or the Church? The community of faith has been given the gift of the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit cannot lie. You KNOW this! And yet, you willingly "differ from the Church". What sort of response do you expect from us?

Regards