Posted on 10/28/2011 6:59:29 AM PDT by markomalley
October 31 is only three days away. For Protestants, it is Reformation Day, the date in 1517 on which Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to that famous door in Wittenberg, Germany. Since I returned to the Catholic Church in April 2007, each year the commemoration has become a time of reflection about my own journey and the puzzles that led me back to the Church of my youth.
One of those puzzles was the relationship between the Church, Tradition, and the canon of Scripture. As a Protestant, I claimed to reject the normative role that Tradition plays in the development of Christian doctrine. But at times I seemed to rely on it. For example, on the content of the biblical canon – whether the Old Testament includes the deuterocanonical books (or “Apocrypha”), as the Catholic Church holds and Protestantism rejects. I would appeal to the exclusion of these books as canonical by the Jewish Council of Jamnia (A.D. 90-100) as well as doubts about those books raised by St. Jerome, translator of the Latin Vulgate, and a few other Church Fathers.
My reasoning, however, was extra-biblical. For it appealed to an authoritative leadership that has the power to recognize and certify books as canonical that were subsequently recognized as such by certain Fathers embedded in a tradition that, as a Protestant, I thought more authoritative than the tradition that certified what has come to be known as the Catholic canon. This latter tradition, rejected by Protestants, includes St. Augustine as well as the Council of Hippo (A.D. 393), the Third Council of Carthage (A.D. 397), the Fourth Council of Carthage (A.D. 419), and the Council of Florence (A.D. 1441).
But if, according to my Protestant self, a Jewish council and a few Church Fathers are the grounds on which I am justified in saying what is the proper scope of the Old Testament canon, then what of New Testament canonicity? So, ironically, given my Protestant understanding of ecclesiology, then the sort of authority and tradition that apparently provided me warrant to exclude the deuterocanonical books from Scripture – binding magisterial authority with historical continuity – is missing from the Church during the development of New Testament canonicity.
The Catholic Church, on the other hand, maintains that this magisterial authority was in fact present in the early Church and thus gave its leadership the power to recognize and fix the New Testament canon. So, ironically, the Protestant case for a deuterocanonical-absent Old Testament canon depends on Catholic intuitions about a tradition of magisterial authority.
This led to two other tensions. First, in defense of the Protestant Old Testament canon, I argued, as noted above, that although some of the Church’s leading theologians and several regional councils accepted what is known today as the Catholic canon, others disagreed and embraced what is known today as the Protestant canon. It soon became clear to me that this did not help my case, since by employing this argumentative strategy, I conceded the central point of Catholicism: the Church is logically prior to the Scriptures. That is, if the Church, until the Council of Florence’s ecumenical declaration in 1441, can live with a certain degree of ambiguity about the content of the Old Testament canon, that means that sola scriptura was never a fundamental principle of authentic Christianity.
After all, if Scripture alone applies to the Bible as a whole, then we cannot know to which particular collection of books this principle applies until the Bible’s content is settled. Thus, to concede an officially unsettled canon for Christianity’s first fifteen centuries seems to make the Catholic argument that sola scriptura was a sixteenth-century invention and, therefore, not an essential Christian doctrine.
Second, because the list of canonical books is itself not found in Scripture – as one can find the Ten Commandments or the names of Christ’s apostles – any such list, whether Protestant or Catholic, would be an item of extra-biblical theological knowledge. Take, for example, a portion of the revised and expanded Evangelical Theological Society statement of faith suggested (and eventually rejected by the membership) by two ETS members following my return to the Catholic Church. It states that, “this written word of God consists of the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments and is the supreme authority in all matters of belief and behavior.”
But the belief that the Bible consists only of sixty-six books is not a claim of Scripture, since one cannot find the list in it, but a claim about Scripture as a whole. That is, the whole has a property – i.e., “consisting of sixty-six books,” – that is not found in any of the parts. In other words, if the sixty-six books are the supreme authority on matters of belief, and the number of books is a belief, and one cannot find that belief in any of the books, then the belief that Scripture consists of sixty-six particular books is an extra-biblical belief, an item of theological knowledge that is prima facie non-biblical.
For the Catholic, this is not a problem, since the Bible is the book of the Church, and thus there is an organic unity between the fixing of the canon and the development of doctrine and Christian practice.
Although I am forever indebted to my Evangelical brethren for instilling and nurturing in me a deep love of Scripture, it was that love that eventually led me to the Church that had the authority to distinguish Scripture from other things.
Proof to me, that intellect, education and accomplishment are no proof of understanding, competence or wisdom.
One of those puzzles was the relationship between the Church, Tradition, and the canon of Scripture. As a Protestant, I claimed to reject the normative role that Tradition plays in the development of Christian doctrine. But at times I seemed to rely on it. For example, on the content of the biblical canon – whether the Old Testament includes the deuterocanonical books (or “Apocrypha”), as the Catholic Church holds and Protestantism rejects. I would appeal to the exclusion of these books as canonical by the Jewish Council of Jamnia (A.D. 90-100) as well as doubts about those books raised by St. Jerome, translator of the Latin Vulgate, and a few other Church Fathers. My reasoning, however, was extra-biblical. For it appealed to an authoritative leadership that has the power to recognize and certify books as canonical that were subsequently recognized as such by certain Fathers embedded in a tradition that, as a Protestant, I thought more authoritative than the tradition that certified what has come to be known as the Catholic canon. This latter tradition, rejected by Protestants, includes St. Augustine as well as the Council of Hippo (A.D. 393), the Third Council of Carthage (A.D. 397), the Fourth Council of Carthage (A.D. 419), and the Council of Florence (A.D. 1441).October 31 is only three days away. For Protestants, it is Reformation Day, the date in 1517 on which Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to that famous door in Wittenberg, Germany. Since I returned to the Catholic Church in April 2007, each year the commemoration has become a time of reflection about my own journey and the puzzles that led me back to the Church of my youth.
The 16th Century Reformers' understanding of the authority of scripture does NOT rely on certain writings being recognized by Church authorities. This may be what Dr. Beckwith was taught--or what he understood, or what many Protestants today understand is the basis of the final authority of the Bible, but, that is NOT how the original Reformers understood it. The direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit--present when the ink of the Apostles dried on the papyrus of what became the New Testament--is what established the authority of the holy Scriptures.
How was that inspiration recognized by the world? By the power of testimony of the first (and only) Apostles. The Church is "built," according to the Apostle Paul, "on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone." (Ephesians 2:20)
To say that the authority of the Church is equal to Scripture...because the Church authorities recognized and formally approved of Scripture, is a bit like saying that if Congress passed, next week, a resolution, recognizing and approving the authority of the U. S. Constitution, that Congress shows that it has equal authority to the Constitution... What nonsense!!! Congress, and all the US Government, as it is formed (in theory at least)....is a CREATION of the U. S. Constitution, NOT it's partner, nor certainly its Master.
Of course the Constitution, is a creation of the 1st Continental Congress--the Founding Fathers--analogous to the "apostles and prophets" St. Paul spoke of...but, that "founding father" status was not handed down to the next Congress, or generations of US politicians, it was only found in that first generation. Yes, the analogy breaks down, as the Constitution can be amended, and a new continental congress could possibly be formed--throwing out the old US Constitution (shudder...let us hope not). Such are the institutions of men. None-the-less, significant parallels remain.
So too, the Church...is a creation of a group of "founding fathers" that is the original Apostles--whom they themselves identified as someone who knew Jesus on earth personally and was a "witness to His resurrection." (Acts 1:22). The undisputed record of their teachings, is found recorded in ONE place, that is the New Testament books, that is the Constitution...of the Church. Does that make the Church, her traditions, her councils, her wise teachers (such as Augustine or Aquinas), of ZERO authority (as many evangelicals, or other mis-taught Christians, perhaps such as Beckwith was....think)? No, not at all--as with the US Constitution is toward the US government's secular authority, the Bible is the foundation, and establishment for Church authority--both in council, wise individuals, and, traditions....AS LONG AS THOSE LESSOR AUTHORITIES STAY UNDER THE "CONSTITUTIONAL," or full, final, and inerrant, AUTHORITY OF THE BIBLE.
But if, according to my Protestant self, a Jewish council and a few Church Fathers are the grounds on which I am justified in saying what is the proper scope of the Old Testament canon, then what of New Testament canonicity? So, ironically, given my Protestant understanding of ecclesiology, then the sort of authority and tradition that apparently provided me warrant to exclude the deuterocanonical books from Scripture – binding magisterial authority with historical continuity – is missing from the Church during the development of New Testament canonicity.Before the Council of Trent of the 1560s, there was no formal & final recognition of the Apocryphal books by the Roman Catholic authorities. In fact, the name "Apocrypha" is the name which the translator of the Latin Vulgate--THE medieval Bible--St. Jerome gave it--because he didn't believe the Apocryphal books were canon. Neither did Origen, Melito of Sardis, Athanasius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory of Nazianzus, Hilary of Poitiers, Epiphanius, Basil the Great, Jerome, Rufinus, even Pope Gregory the Great--and perhaps the majority of ancient Church Fathers, and medieval theologians. The Jewish religion in Jesus' day--a point of which Jesus never refuted--too, rejected these books as canonical--in fact the LXX (Greek version of the Old Testament--primary bible to 1st Century Jews) excluded the Apocrypha at first (ca. 200 BC) only including it later.
The Catholic Church, on the other hand, maintains that this magisterial authority was in fact present in the early Church and thus gave its leadership the power to recognize and fix the New Testament canon. So, ironically, the Protestant case for a deuterocanonical-absent Old Testament canon depends on Catholic intuitions about a tradition of magisterial authority.Wrong. It depends on recognizing the Holy Spirit worked even among the Jews...allowing them the discernment between His word, and the legends and fairy tales (see the Apocryphal book of Tobit, or Bell and the Dragon--as examples of completely nonsensical legends--NOT found in the REAL bible) of the Apocrypha.
This led to two other tensions. First, in defense of the Protestant Old Testament canon, I argued, as noted above, that although some of the Church’s leading theologians and several regional councils accepted what is known today as the Catholic canon, others disagreed and embraced what is known today as the Protestant canon. It soon became clear to me that this did not help my case, since by employing this argumentative strategy, I conceded the central point of Catholicism: the Church is logically prior to the Scriptures. That is, if the Church, until the Council of Florence’s ecumenical declaration in 1441, can live with a certain degree of ambiguity about the content of the Old Testament canon, that means that sola scriptura was never a fundamental principle of authentic Christianity.(Sigh)The good-news of the Apostles, or really, through the Apostles from the Holy Spirit, is what created the Church. The Church is not logically prior to the gospel which created her... That good news--with the authority of the Aposles--was written-down, covenant/legal-fashion ("if it ain't written, its not enforceable..." old legal expression) in the New Testament books. Do you want the authority of the Apostles? Look to the Bible, not a very demonstrably fallible human institution.
After all, if Scripture alone applies to the Bible as a whole, then we cannot know to which particular collection of books this principle applies until the Bible’s content is settled. Thus, to concede an officially unsettled canon for Christianity’s first fifteen centuries seems to make the Catholic argument that sola scriptura was a sixteenth-century invention and, therefore, not an essential Christian doctrine.
This only is logical IF, and only IF, the bible is only as authoritative as the Church recognizes it to be--and that logically assumes Church equal in authority to scripture. Is Dr. Becket claiming that before the Councils of Carthage et al., the NT books had no authority? Nonsense! From the day they were written down--they had absolute Apostolic authority of the Holy Spirit...recognized officially, or not.
Second, because the list of canonical books is itself not found in Scripture – as one can find the Ten Commandments(ACTUALLY, THE NUMBERING OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS IS NOWHERE IN SCRIPTURE....AND THERE ARE DIFFERENT WAYS TO NUMBER THEM)
or the names of Christ’s apostles – any such list, whether Protestant or Catholic, would be an item of extra-biblical theological knowledge. Take, for example, a portion of the revised and expanded Evangelical Theological Society statement of faith suggested (and eventually rejected by the membership) by two ETS members following my return to the Catholic Church. It states that, “this written word of God consists of the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments and is the supreme authority in all matters of belief and behavior.”Only logical if the Bible is treated like any other book...without 1st acknowledging its supernatural inspiration. The books of the Bible, with utterly unique authority--cannot logically appeal to exterior authority to prove themselves--hence they are, as God is Himself...("I am, that I am") self-authenticating. That we, the Church have recognized that list of books, in no way proves that we the Church have equal authority to those books (see the Continental Congress reasoning above).But the belief that the Bible consists only of sixty-six books is not a claim of Scripture, since one cannot find the list in it, but a claim about Scripture as a whole. That is, the whole has a property – i.e., “consisting of sixty-six books,” – that is not found in any of the parts. In other words, if the sixty-six books are the supreme authority on matters of belief, and the number of books is a belief, and one cannot find that belief in any of the books, then the belief that Scripture consists of sixty-six particular books is an extra-biblical belief, an item of theological knowledge that is prima facie non-biblical.
For the Catholic, this is not a problem, since the Bible is the book of the Church, and thus there is an organic unity between the fixing of the canon and the development of doctrine and Christian practice.
Except for the fact that anyone who is informed and honest can see, a very fallible, broken, sinful visible Church--in her present and her history--and if she is equal in authority to God's Word--what kind of God is that???
Although I am forever indebted to my Evangelical brethren for instilling and nurturing in me a deep love of Scripture, it was that love that eventually led me to the Church that had the authority to distinguish Scripture from other things.An authority LESS than the Bible, created by, and derived from, the Holy Spirit working in the prophets and the Apostles....who also created the Scripture--God's Word--to whom all authorities--even that of Rome--must bow.
ALL of them were churchmen. ALL of them submitted their judgement about what Scripture meant to that of the Church.
NONE of them would have recognized the modern Protestant understanding of "Sola Scriptura" according to YOPIOS.
But here some one perhaps will ask, Since the canon of Scripture is complete, and sufficient of itself for everything, and more than sufficient, what need is there to join with it the authority of the Church's interpretation? For this reason—because, owing to the depth of Holy Scripture, all do not accept it in one and the same sense, but one understands its words in one way, another in another; so that it seems to be capable of as many interpretations as there are interpreters. For Novatian expounds it one way, Sabellius another, Donatus another, Arius, Eunomius, Macedonius, another, Photinus, Apollinaris, Priscillian, another, Iovinian, Pelagius, Celestius, another, lastly, Nestorius another. Therefore, it is very necessary, on account of so great intricacies of such various error, that the rule for the right understanding of the prophets and apostles should be framed in accordance with the standard of Ecclesiastical and Catholic interpretation.
-- Vincent of Lerins, Commonitoria, AD 434
Absolutely, completely, and utterly false.
They were recognized by the Council of Florence in 1442 (Bull of Union with the Copts).
They were recognized by a letter of Pope Innocent I, AD 408.
They were recognized by the 3rd Council of Carthage, AD 397.
They were recognized by the Council of Hippo, AD 393.
They were recognized by the "Tome" of Pope Damasus read at the Council of Rome, AD 382.
At that point, we're back to an era when the New Testament canon was still in flux.
Doesn't it bother you that Protestant apologists blatantly lie about something that can be easily demonstrated from history?
Quite untrue, AR. See my post above.
All Trent did (that Florence didn't do) was to add an anathema to the denial of the canon. That makes perfect sense, historically, because nobody was actively denying the canonicity of the deuterocanonical books at the time of Florence.
I put their own words out there for all to see and decide for themselves.
Concerning the work of these councils, William Penn writes as follows: "I say how do they know that these men discerned true from spurious? Now, sure it is, that some of the Scriptures taken in by one council were rejected by another for apocryphal, and that which was left out by the former for apocryphal was taken in by the latter for canonical." (Penn's Works, Vol. I, p. 302).
Eusebius in the fourth century disputed Hebrews, James, Second and Third John, Jude, Revelation, shepherd of Hermas, Epicstle of Brnabas, Acts of Paul, and Revelation of Peter.
Athanasius rejected Esther, and Epiphanius accepted the Epistle of Jeremiah. Chrysostom omitted ten books from his canon-- First and Second Chronicles, Esther, Job, and Lamentations from the Old Testament and Second Peter, Second and Third John, Jude, and Revelation, of the New Testament. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, and Gregory, Bishop of Constantinople, both rejected Revelation.
See post 106
Was the Council of Florance before or after there were two, then three Popes claiming the supposed See of Peter? All that neat, clean, uncorrupted Curia of the Renaissance?
Oh, that’s right it was after the Council of Constance of 1418 which condemned the heroic Czech reformer Father John Huss to be burned to death—after a kangaroo court denied that the guarantee given Huss of free passage was valid (promises to heretics were deemed of no authority...). THAT was also the council that restored one Pope as in charge—out of the “Babylonian Captivity.” It also made Councils superior in authority to Popes, which Pope Martin V quickly contradicted (authoritatively, of course).
All of this is rot....putting individuals, traditions, or institutions of men in authority over and above God’s Word given by the Apostles. Really—all in innovation, confusion and rebellion against the authority of Peter, Paul, John and all the Apostles—as recorded in holy Scripture.
It’s interesting you brought up the Anathamas (authoritative curses) of Trent too, as they clearly condemned to eternal Hell anyone who believed in justification by faith alone, that is all Protestants....that is until Vatican II called Protestants Christians and separated brethren.
So which is it...we who trust in Christ by faith alone are Hell bound...or brothers? These two supposedly fully authoritative councils, Trent and Vatican II, simply cannot be honestly reconciled.
More (and yet more) proof that Councils, Popes, and traditions have erred and contradicted each other, and do not have the authority of the Word of the Apostles-—that is the Word of God written, the Bible.
There seems to be a lot of things you don't see in the scriptures...But they are there...We see them...
Surely nobody read that and you wasted tons of bandwitdh...I didn’t read it...If I want to read a book, I’ll got to Amazon.com...
The fact is, we have little problem understanding the scripture alone...But when you stick unbiblical, anti-biblical so called tradition on equal footing, of course the bible makes no sense...
You have to twist, pervert, deny and add to the scriptures to get even parts of them to line up with your made up tradition...
I assume that's why you guys don't bother with the majority of scripture...It would take an army of scripture perverters to change the entire bible and keep it readable, even amongst yourselves...
So your Clement call himself an Apostle, eh??? And he wrote a bunch of books for the eyes of his bishops only
I would say it's a matter of he knows better than you...
And she wore a uniform with a big M on the front of it while her cape waved in the wind...
And she sprinkled Mary-dust upon the little Portuguese children as she ascended...
Well, the Bible didn't say it didn't happen like that...
It wasn't the Word...It was the word...
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
In this case, it was the word spoken to them...Any of the words spoken to them or read to them by the ministers and Apostles of Jesus Christ...
They received the word as true believers in Jesus Christ and they then searched the scriptures to see that they were true...
That may be out of the realm and reach of you philosophical religionists but that's what the verse says, in its simplicity...
2 Thessalonians 2:14 Therefore, brethren, stand fast; and hold the traditions which you have learned, whether by word, or by our epistle.
The OR shows that they are the same words, whether spoken or written...
Of course Catholics are not Christians in the biblical sense of the word...It wasn't that long ago that Catholics would get offended if you called them Christians...
Aside from the fact that Ignatius’ writings are forgeries foisted upon your religion, does you religion consider those writings to be equal with God Holy Scripture???
Where does the bible say that she died and was buried and that was that?
If you can show me I’ll happily accept your version of things.
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