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Posted on 07/03/2012 9:31:36 AM PDT by Teófilo
Another nail in the coffin of the foundational Protestant dogma
Sola scriptura is dead, or at least is undead, a zombie still stalking the darkened hallways of Protestantism. Many well-meaning Protestant Christians don’t see the zombie-dogma for what it is; instead, they choose to see it as a being of light. My friend Dave Armstrong has returned to blow the old decrepit sola scriptura monsters one at a time in his latest work, 100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura.
Let’s recall the definition of the sola scriptura dogma – yes, it is a dogma – as understood by Norman Geisler, a recognized Protestant authority Dave quotes in his work:
By sola scriptura orthodox Protestants mean that Scripture alone is the primary and absolute source of authority, the final court of appeal, for all doctrine and practice (faith and morals)… (p.16)Geisler, and other authorities Dave quotes, further explain that other authorities exist, but that these are of secondary importance. Geisler also defends what he calls the perspicuity of Holy Writ, which means that anyone can understand the basic truths of Scripture: the plain things are the main things and the main things are the plain things, Geisler states. (p.17). As a true analyst, Dave separated the sola scriptura dogma into its constituents claims, found out its contents, examined its individual parts, and studied the structure of sola scriptura as whole. He found them defective and insufficient to expound and explain the full spectrum of Christian claims.
Dave kills the sola scriptura zombie by selecting 100 verses from Scripture contradicting this central Protestant claim. I guess he selected 100 verses because the number “100” gives the reader a sense of exhaustive answer and completion, not because there are only 100 verses that should make all sincere Protestant Christian at least uncomfortable with the teaching. In fact, Dave is the author of another related work, 501 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura: Is the Bible the Only Infallible Authority?, which is useful if you need another 401 arguments to kill the sola scriptura zombie dead.
100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura. is a distillation of the 501 Biblical Arguments… in a more manageable, less overwhelming fashion for the beginning reader. It’s 133 pages in length and divided into two parts. In Part 1 Dave discusses the binding authority of Tradition, as substantiated in Scripture, and in Part 2 he discusses the binding authority of the Church, again from Scripture. The result must be uncontestable to the sincere Protestant Christian as well as eye opening to the full range of deeds and wonders the Incarnation of the Word of God brought to history.Will the sola scriptura zombie really die after Dave’s work? This is a senseless question because the zombie is already dead. It’s kept ambulating by strings pulled from the most diehard of its followers. Those strings must be cut by the individual, sincere Protestant Christian himself. Dave Armstrong’s work, 100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura. not only blows the zombie of sola scriptura away, he also provides the truth-searcher with the scissors to cut off the strings.
So while I do not claim to have completely solved the puzzle..
I wonder if you see it as every person's duty/responsibility to solve the puzzle - here I am referring to the Christian Faith.
Is each tasked with his/her own interpretation, entailing learning the languages, etc.? Logically this would also require going further back to determining which books, which translations. One would need to become both a competent linguist and well-versed historian as well.
Is each Christian tasked with determining from this interpretation the sacraments (whether they even exist), the nature of God and Christ, the Holy Trinity, etc.? Is each tasked to determine soteriology, theology, eschatology and praxis?
It seems in this scheme each is on their own to invent or re-invent, discover or re-discover the "true" Christian Faith. And when would one be certain that they had, at last, truly solved the puzzle?
I appreciate your discussion...
Secondly, Acts 2:39 states about Baptism that "For the promise is to you and to your children and to all that are far off, every one whom the Lord our God calls to him"
As Christ said that no one can enter heaven unless he has been born again of water and the Holy Spirit (John 3:5) he also said "Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them; and when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, ‘Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of God’" (Luke 18:15–16).
Circumcision was and is given to infants and later there is the bar-mitzah. Similarly baptism and confirmation is separated in orthodoxy
There is no indication that all his family did not include infants or even that all of the family fully understood in one hour what they were doing and why before they got baptised.
By no means do I condemn anyone, even a Christian Scientist. I just answered your statement of You want to see your church as the original based on the NT, but I see the basics of most churches -- I don't see the CS way as similar to the original in any way. They may be happy with that and as to an individual's salvation, I am in no position to comment and will not do so -- that's between him/her and God.
It took your religion 400 years to invent a description of the Trinity, apparently because it didn't like what the scriptures had to say about the Trinity...
And anyone who doesn't accept your religion's invention is a heretic...
Ya, you got it...
You raise an interesting question. How much expertise in Bible study is enough? That’s sort of like when they asked Rockefeller how much more money he needed, and he answered, only a little bit more.
But I think what you might really be asking is how much is enough to meet the minimum requirements for Christian faith. Especially if you have no Magisterium to tell you where that threshold is.
Of course, because Scripture is sufficient as a rule of faith, it gives us a clue. What did the believing thief on the cross next to Jesus know? By our standards, not much. Yet he believed in God, and he believed in Jesus as the Savior God had sent, and apparently that was enough for Jesus to promise him paradise that very day. Do you think I would trade all the expertise in the world to have Jesus speak those same words directly to me in my dying moments? Yes I would. Absolutely I would.
And yet God has also given gifts to all believers, both natural and those uniquely from the Holy Spirit, one of which is teaching. So it is clear we are intended to be always growing in the knowledge of the truth, and that we are to give respect to those whom God has chosen to be our teachers, because we have much to gain from them.
Nevertheless, all believers are accountable to the whole body of Christ. If a teacher wanders off into falsehood, however well-intended they may be, they are subject to correction, and that correction need not come from within any particular structure. Paul was truly an apostle, yet he did not come to the faith through the original 12, but God brought him in on his own. Yet this same person was both recognized by the original apostles, and was even in a position to rebuke Peter for succumbing to those who wanted to backslide into subservience to Moses.
Also notice, Paul did not go to war with Peter over obscure meanings of rare words. He went after Peter over something big, something that should have been blazing obvious, that the Gospel of Christ sets us free from bondage to our glaring imperfections under the law, because it is all of grace. Peter of all people should have been able to connect those dots, with his own recent failure in the moment of trial.
I am reminded at this point of something CS Lewis said. It isn’t the things in the Bible I don’t understand that bother me. It’s the things I do understand. God is perfectly able to reach us with the truth we need. But we are all too often unwilling to embrace the truth we already have. That is a spiritual problem that no system or mechanism for theological interpretation can solve, Sola Scriptura or otherwise. We are sinners, and we act like it. Only God’s grace can redeem us, and although the full extent of that grace will not be fully known until the end, it will prove sufficient to save all those who put their trust in him.
“... you do not believe in the body of Christ being in the Eucharist, not in the Catholic sense, nor in the Lutheran, correct?”
Not in the sense transubstantiation asserts, no. Spiritual presence invokes no physicality, no corporeality, and therefore no temptation to the adoration of the signs in themselves, and no temporal confusion over the once for all offering of the corporeal Christ.
I am not strong enough on the Lutheran concept of “Sacred Union” to offer meaningful comment, except that it is clearly not transubstantiation either, although from what I have read it does appear to allow the idea of corporeal presence, yet more in the nature of two substances sharing space versus one substance being swapped for another. I am sure someone of a Lutheran persuasion could explain it better than I.
Of course, because Scripture is sufficient as a rule of faith,
Why? How is this determined for a sola scriptura adherent? Is it a priori, if so, why? How do you know the interpretation is correct, that these are historically the right books, etc.? Wouldn't you have to figure out for yourself first - or trust the sources, in this case the Church that, at the very least preserved and copied them up to the point of the Reformation?
And once you get past this, you have to get to your statement: Scripture is sufficient as a rule of faith
Aren't you required to either trust translators and theologians somewhere or become one yourself?
Isn't there a tremendous amount before you even get to what you state as the beginning point here?
Hope this is clearer...
You are intertwining two arguments here...Sola Scriptura and the legitimacy of the so called Apocrypha books. The Apocryphal books arguement is a separate subject from Sola Scriptura. I will argue that should the earlier church fathers had fully decided by fasting and faith, under the guidance of the Spirit(there was not unanimous acceptance of the Apocrypha, even in the 4th century AD) that the books should have been considered fully legitimate, their full acceptance by present and future “departments” of the Faith would not alter the pro Sola Scriptura argument, rather it strengthens it.
Indeed, there is much in the Apocrypha books that would refute Catholic magisterial tradition...so perhaps it isn't wise to refer to them as part of an apologetic concerning an anti sola scriptoral position.
Please post early Christian writings to support your belief of the Trinity?
I can post many to support Catholic and mainstream protestant beliefs on the Trinity according to my faith.
Something becoming dogma has only to do with heretics effecting the faithful and gaining ground, it has nothing to do with a time frame
If I couldn't find it in the scriptures, I wouldn't believe in it...I do not however find the Catholic version of the Trinity anywhere in the scriptures...
Sorry it took so long to get back to you. Stuff happens.
Anyway, I think to answer your question on bootstrapping into Sola Scriptura, I have to challenge the premise a bit. Bootstrapping suggests starting with nothing, and that hints at a misconception about Sola Scriptura. Sola Scriptura does not automatically devalue natural revelation, reason, history in general, church history in particular, science, philosophy, or any other potentially beneficial area of knowledge. It merely ensures that secondary information remains secondary.
And so we do not start from nothing. We accept that there is natural revelation, history, an early community of faith that all left a record we may examine.
But how does one know to use Scripture as the final court of appeal for matters of Christian faith and conduct? To me, this is a bit like asking how we know water should be used for taking a shower. In natural logic, it is self-evident that a book that claims to be God-breathed should be consulted if one desires to discover the mind of God. However, one might find some such books disappointing, with failed prophecies, inferior moral content, full of error and fantasy, or incomplete. So more must be expected from such a book. The writing must live up to its claim to be inspired by God. We would expect it to be something like this:
Heb 4:12 “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
As you are doubtless aware, the writer of Hebrews has just made an argument for entering into God’s rest, based on analogy with the OT Scriptural example of Israel. He is not using some sophisticated argument from human epistemology to persuade his readers they should heed OT authority. He is proclaiming that they are obligated to heed this written example because God’s word is a living thing, a power unto itself, a sword that cuts to the very heart of man’s relationship with God.
In other words, he simply assumes the same God who wrote the Scripture will authenticate that Scripture to the reader. He makes no appeal to human authority, impliedly because he believes none is necessary. God has spoken. What else can be added to that?
But is this a valid assumption? What would reason tell us? If there is a God, and he wanted to speak with us, he would authenticate his own words. In other words, we could expect any God-breathed Scriptures to be self-authenticating, because by definition, they are supernaturally able to achieve their objective:
Isaiah 55:11 “So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”
But if self-authentication looks too tautological to you, keep in mind it is how natural revelation works as well:
Rom 1:19 “Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. [20] For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: [21] Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”
So tautology or no, this looks like God’s modus operandi. He signs his own books with a signature that resonates in the human heart:
1Thess 2:13 “For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.”
And …
1Cor 2:4 “And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: [5] That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.”
Notice Paul’s claim of apostolic authority is not based on any appeal to human authority but is set exclusively on the self-authenticating nature of God. It is this premise, this quality of God, that Sola Scriptura picks up on as the basis for holding all human opinion in second place to the God-breathed written word.
Yet even in Paul’s day, the doctrinal wars were beginning. And what then was Paul’s attitude toward secondary, sub-apostolic sources? Not too pretty, especially when they conflicted with apostolic truth already entered into the public record:
Col 2:8 “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. [9] For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.”
Here we have Paul defending the deity of Christ against the Gnostics. As you might be aware, the Gnostics claimed to have an alternate source of necessary truth, the secret key that could unlock the interpretation of the public record of Jesus and the Apostles. Only you had to buy into them being the dispensers of that secret knowledge, the “gnosis.”
But does Paul appeal to any human authority? No. He simply declares well-known apostolic truth concerning the deity of Christ, reminding the Colossians of all those basic truths of the basic Gospel, the person, the death and the resurrection of Jesus, that set them free from their sins.
And how did Anthanasius defend against the Arian uprising? Did he appeal to secondary, unrecorded traditions containing secret knowledge? Or did he appeal to the alleged universal authority of the Bishop of Rome? Or did he ground his argument, root and branch, in Scripture? You already know the answer to that question.
Thus Sola Scriptura is inferred from the nature of God, the apostolic practices, and the patristic record. Does one have to believe a few things about God a priori to get there? Yes, but that’s OK, because how else could it be:
John 6:68 “Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. [69] And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God.”
The apostles were just fallible men. In deciding to follow Jesus and his words no matter what, they might have made a fallible decision. But they made it anyway. Because God helps us fallible men and women, because he loves us, and knows we need the help. And so against all the odds, he speaks to us, and we hear his voice:
Mat 11:25 “At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. [26] Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight. [27] All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.”
Peace,
SR
Ok, I wanted to check if you agreed with the Lutheran concept. The reason being that I do not have enough knowledge to argue the differences between Catholic and Lutheran positions. Between the positions of "is there a real physical presence" and there is only a spiritual presence, I have more knowledge.
let me get back to you later this week on this topic to carry on this interesting debate.
very well, but to Oneness Pentecostals this is an essential way to show you are saved. This is what they read, sola scriptura
you may interpret it as that, but to others, that is not true -- to lutherans for example
What really matters is that one follow’s Christ’s teachings — He tells us to repent, believe, be baptised, eat of His body and Blood and endure to the end. His grace is what saves us, nothing else, not mouthing “Lord, Lord”, not going through sacraments while sinning away.
>> they hold to Sola Scriptura too, yet have a radically different concept
So?
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