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Really, where did Christ say that individuals need to read and determine their own doctrine. God formed a people, the people of Israel and saved them as a community, which prefigured the Church, founded by Christ who was sent by the Father and thus Christ sent the Apostles. THere was no Sola MEO everybody doing their own thing.

From http://contra-gentes.blogspot.com/2008/04/doctrinal-chaos-argument-one-of.html:

There was no infallible teaching authority under the Old Covenant system, and this even resulted in a number of competing viewpoints once the idea of theology began to develop after the death of the last prophet. The Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Zealots, the schools of Hillel vs. Shamai were all sects in existence at the time of Christ. If God did not find it necessary to install an infallible teaching authority under this covenant with the competition of viewpoints that resulted, then why should we think that any disunity under the New Covenant is unacceptable?

Of course, at this point, the Catholic or Orthodox apologist may retort that because there has been a change in covenants to a “better” covenant, the New, with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, then the gift of infallibility has been given and God’s standard of unity has changed. There are a few problems with this that come to mind. First, it assumes that the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is supposed to cause institutional unity. Where’s the exegetical argument? Second, as it applies to the Roman Catholic Magesterium, the counter-argument assumes that the Holy Spirit would only be given to a teaching authority. Thirdly and related to the second point, Scripture, especially in the Old Testament prophets, says that not only will the teaching authority not be more centralized, it will be more decentralized! The prophets make it clear that what was given exclusively to the teaching classes of the prophets, priests, and kings, namely the charismata, would be given to all the members of the New Covenant:

“But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the LORD, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the LORD, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

“You will have plenty to eat and be satisfied and praise the name of the LORD your God, Who has dealt wondrously with you; then My people will never be put to shame. Thus you will know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the LORD your God, and there is no other; and My people will never be put to shame. It will come about after this that I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind; and your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on the male and female servants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.” (Joel 2:26-29)

Of course you will trust the Bible, Arius had his view of the Bible, Nestorius had his view, going back to the 2nd Century, Marcion and the Gnostics had their view. The funny thing is everybody claims that they are reading the Bible and they have the correc interpretation. So, you join a great tradition of folks thinking they have read the Bible and come up with orthodox Doctrine.

Comments such as this ignore the fact that even among the Apostles, their "authority" was not infallible. Peter, for example, had to be corrected by Paul concerning the doctrine over Gentiles needing to be circumcised to be Christians. God has given us His inspired (God breathed) Scripture so that it contains the infallible truths the Apostles DID teach and it insures we can remain faithful to those revealed truths even two thousand years later. On the essential doctrines of the Christian faith, there is unity - even among "Protestants" - as long as the Scriptures remain the authority that governs our rule of faith. From the same link above concerning the necessity of "unity":

In fact, according to Reformed theology, God in His providence allows for competition among viewpoints so that the truth will be revealed and refined (1 Corinthians 11:19). In this case, disunity is a means unto an end. Lastly, the appeal to John 10:16 and John 17:20-21 is eisegetical since the unity being spoken of there refers to a unity of all people groups (i.e., ethnic and diachronic) rather than an institutional unity (see John 11:51-52).

In summary, to assume that the main function of one’s rule of faith is to be a problem-solving device which brings about visible unity simply begs the question in favor of high-church ecclesiology. Rather, the rule of faith is only supposed to show us what we should believe about God and our duty to Him. Thus, the argument is dead because it commits this fundamental fallacy.

Overstatement of Division: The argument overstates the differences between Protestant groups. In reality, most Protestant groups are very much united doctrinally. As J.I. Packer noted:

“The extent of unanimity among its adherents has been remarkable. If one reviews the historic Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican, Congregational and Baptist confessions, or compares, for example Calvin’s Institutes with the systematic theologies of F. Pieper the Lutheran, Charles Hodge and Louis Berkhof the Presbyterians, E.A. Litton and W.H. Griffith Thomas the Anglicans, W.B. Pope the Methodist and A.H. Strong the Baptist, or if one examines the preaching and spirituality of churches which actively upheld sola Scriptura as a principle for determining faith and action, what impresses is the oneness of overall outlook and the width of the area over which substantially identical positions were taught. Whether those involved felt close to each other as they sparred over points of specific agreement, or defended their denominations against criticism, is perhaps doubtful; but what is not doubtful is that those who historically have held to sola Scriptura, recognizing no magesterium save that of the Bible itself, have been at one on all essentials and on most details too, in a very striking way. If evidence tending to confirm the clarity of Scripture is called for, this fact will surely qualify.”

boatbums:

You have articulated a Reformed view, which is a view that did not exist until the 16th century. Philip Schaff, the German Reformed Church Historian, who was among the 1st Protestant Church Historians to go back and examine the Church Fathers makes the point. If one believes that from the Time of Christ and then the death of the last apostle, that Christian Doctrine was absent till the 16th century, I find that totally heretical in that it goes against Christ and the Incarnation that he came and passed on the faith to the apostles and that faith was handed on and as Christ said, I will be with till the end of the ages and I will send the Holy Spirit to you to lead you to all truth. That occurred at Pentecost. So from basically from the death of St. John the Apostle, nobody had a source of orthdodoxy.

This line of thinking is similar to the Marxist, in that they hate “History” for to them, History has been shaped by Western Culture and Christianity. Therefore, it has produced a culture bias that goes against the marxist view that “We [a set group of marxist elite]” can shape the future into what “We [a set group of marxist elite” think it should be. In other words, History is shunned and the future is “what the marxist say it is in terms of morality, social virtures, law, family, etc”.

Now, not that I am suggesting that Reformed Christians are marxist. No, but the underlying principle is not dissimiliar in that both the Protestant principle of sola scriptura and modern secular individualism/marxism, etc are both rooted in the rationist thought that came out of the 16th century and was a direct consequence of the Protestant movement.

Packer can make that claim all he wants, I think he is an Anglican who is Reformed in his theology. I don’t even need to go any further than the Anglican Community that at the Doctrinal level [Individuals in any confession may embrace said Church’s doctrines at different levels, that applies to Catholics as well] is split among several factions, Reformed, Evangelical, those similar to the Methodist, those that are similar to the Unitarians (think Espicopalians in the U.S.] and those with more Catholic leanings [referred to as Anglo-catholics, many of which have recently come into full communion with Rome].

Now, I do agree with you that Jewish Beliefs were not monolothic, that is correct, but that doesn’t translate into thinking that Christ, who was the 2nd Person of the Trinity and thus was God’s Eternal Word, came into the world to leave humanity with no objective doctrine. That to me flies in the face of Incarnational Theology.

Christ became Incarnate to reveal the Truth of God [Truth/True and Love are the 2 words Christ used the most in the Gospels] thus I can’t accept that Christ when he founded a Church [St. Matthews Gospel states that He did, Mt. 16:18-19 and St. Paul refers to as the Pillar and Foundation of Truth, c.f 1 Timothy 3:15] decided to leave those followers who came after the Apostles grasping at straws to determine what is orthodox Doctrine.

Ulitimately, all of those Protestant groups you cite embrace some in total, or some in degree, the confessions of the 3 Main Reformed Protestant groups, Anglican [39 articles], Reformed [Westminister] or Lutheran {Aubsberg] and each of those where shaped by the theology of the authors, in the case of the Anglican it was Crammer then later Parker who shaped the final 39 articles, the Westminiser is JOhn Calvin and the Augsberg are Martin Luther.

Now, despite what A.J. Packer states, none of these are in agreement on the Justification [100%], Sacraments [100%}, Liturgy and Worshp [100%] and that is just the start. Yes, they all uphold to some degree sola Scriptura but that has not led to a Doctrinal consistency at the Confessional level, again, not withstanding that in any Protestant Confession as well as the Catholic Church, you will find individuals at various ends of the spectrum in terms of how much of said Confession they embrace.

Even though the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church have not been in Full COmmunion since the 11th century, it is remarkable how similar they are in Doctrine and Liturgy [say 99%]. the Only thing really still a major stumbling block is the nature of the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome as even the Orthodox concede Rome did have a Primacy in the early Church, now what is the nature of it and how it is exercised is the major question there.

They embrace the Councils and Creeds [thus Holy Tradition] in the same fashion as the Catholic Church and maybe more so thus It is the Church and 1) Sacred Scripture and 2) Sacred Tradition that are one unified reality in that they all flow from Christ. It is the protestant position of sola scriptura that is the historical novelty and that is the reality whether you or any of the other Protestant guys/ladies here will acknowledge it.