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To: adiaireton8; Alex Murphy; Alamo-Girl; xzins; P-Marlowe; Dr. Eckleburg
The irony is that you are getting this idea from the book formed by and within the Church. So you want the Church's book, but you reject the Church's interpretational authority. There is no promise in Scripture that you, as lone ranger interpreter, are guaranteed to get your theological ducks in a row. The promise Christ gives to His apostles to lead them into all truth ("But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth" - John 16:13) is not a promise that gnostic individualists will be protected from heresy. The promise is specifically to the Apostles, and to their successors, the bishops. We are promised to be led into all truth only insofar as we adhere to the Apostles and their episcopal successors, not with the me-and-my-Bible-and-my-burning-in-the-bosom individualistic methodology.

To say that we "want the Church's book but reject the Church's inspirational authority" is far from ironic. The Church did not give us the Scriptures, the Scriptures gave us the Church. What the Church did was institutionally formalize what was already commonly agreed upon in the Church. They did not determine which works were divinely inspired Scripture and which were something less. They formalized within the ecclesiastical institution of the church those works which were already recognized as Scripture.

As I pointed out earlier though and you confirmed in your post, it really is all about authority.

562 posted on 07/24/2007 1:30:16 PM PDT by Frumanchu (Jerry Falwell: Now a Calvinist in Glory)
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To: Frumanchu
the Scriptures gave us the Church.

Which NT book was preached from on the day of Pentecost?

-A8

564 posted on 07/24/2007 1:40:10 PM PDT by adiaireton8 ("There is no greater evil one can suffer than to hate reasonable discourse." - Plato, Phaedo 89d)
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To: Frumanchu; adiaireton8; Alex Murphy; Alamo-Girl; xzins; P-Marlowe; Dr. Eckleburg
The Church did not give us the Scriptures, the Scriptures gave us the Church. What the Church did was institutionally formalize what was already commonly agreed upon in the Church. They did not determine which works were divinely inspired Scripture and which were something less

Really? And which book of the OT establishes the Church? You do realize the Church was born in 33 AD and there was not a single NT verse written at that time.

Your historical overview is misleading. Some churches read their own set of "Scriptures." couple of hundred years later, they (church hierarchy that you deny) agreed on the majority of books, but still continued to read some books (scrolls that were later rejected (Epistle of Barnabas, for example), while rejecting some scrolls which were later accepted (Relation of John, 1 and 2 Peter, 3 John, etc.). So either way the Church, in order to select the inspired text and reject the non-inspired (some 200 circulating scrolls) had to be lead by the Holy Spirit.

Surely, you don't believe the HS left the Church along with that disobedient priest, Luther?

569 posted on 07/24/2007 2:03:43 PM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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