Posted on 01/01/2014 3:47:12 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Salvation,
Before you try to weasel out of following up on your post concerning the Didache as a connecting link, please show me the evidence. We are discussing whether the bones discovered are from a physical brother of Jesus. Into that discussion, you are presenting a source that supposedly links the Apostolic teaching with the later church.
SO, as no doubt you noticed, the earliest document you have doesn’t show any of the later Roman doctrines: no perpetual virginity, no assumption of Mary, etc. etc.
Now, as to your canard about sola Scriptura not being in the Bible...
FIRST, let’s start by noting that NONE Of the aberrant Roman doctrines mentioned above are in the Bible.
Second, let’s rehash Sola Scriptura “not being in the Bible”
1. The words, sola Scriptura are not in the Bible. The truth that everything you need for salvation is in the Bible. The authority as the ultimate form of revelation is in the Bible.
2. sola Ecclesia is not in the Bible. Note it.
3. Your charge is illogical, as has been pointed out on these threads - yet you continue to recycle it ... as an example:
.......................................................
OBJECTION [by people like Salvation on FR]:
The doctrine of Sola Scriptura contradicts itself. For if the doctrine is true, then it ought itself to be stated in Holy Scripture. But in fact it is not.
REPLY: We are offered an argument of the following form:
(1) Sola Scriptura = “All true propositions are stated in Holy Scripture.”
(2) Sola Scriptura is not stated in Holy Scripture.
(3) Therefore, Sola Scriptura is not a true proposition.
But in fact, the argument should be of the form:
(1) Sola Scriptura = “All truths necessary to salvation are stated in Holy Scripture.”
(2) Sola Scriptura is not stated in Holy Scripture.
(3) Therefore, Sola Scriptura is not a truth necessary to salvation.
http://www.angelfire.com/ny4/djw/lutherantheology.kiefersolascriptura.html
...............................................
4. You can read a very extensive discussion here, which objectively deals with this issue in great detail:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/2671804/posts
In the meantime, perhaps you can find references that support the argument. I for one would absolutely read them.
” In the centuries before Christ came in the flesh, He used His chosen people = the Hebrews = the Jews = Israel, assembled around their priests, prophets, kings. In the centuries since, and until He comes again, He is using His Church = the People of God assembled around their bishops.”
Sure! Agreed. HE did it.
He also used Baalam’s ass. It shows nothing will stop Him from getting his message through - even when people He choose won’t cooperate. He is sovereign.
Under the argument made around here, because God used a group of people, only they can read and interpret the words. If so, the Roman church had better defer interpretation of 2/3 of Scripture to Jewish leaders, and one very small portion to Baalam’s ass. I don’t see that happening.
It is more accurate to thank God for His provsion, treasure it, and study to show yourself approved, as He commands. Interpretation by believers is an important part of that.
From the Cross Christ would have given his Mother to a sibling if there had been one. All the proof I need, because that was the custom at the time.
Instead, Christ gives his mother for safekeeping to St. John, also standing at the foot of the Cross.
You need to keep reading other Catholic sources to find the answer to the other question.
Even Luther, Calvin and Zwingli recognized that Mary was a perpetual virgin. Read their testimonies.
“From the Cross Christ would have given his Mother to a sibling if there had been one. All the proof I need, because that was the custom at the time.”
There is not evidence Jesus’ brother and sisters were there.
“Instead, Christ gives his mother for safekeeping to St. John, also standing at the foot of the Cross.”
Doesn’t say that. More importantly, there is not evidence she ever went to live with him.
“You need to keep reading other Catholic sources to find the answer to the other question.”
Actually, no. I made not truth claim. I am open to seeing your evidence, but apparently, dear FRiend, you have none. If you find some, please share. If you don’t care to find evidence about your core beliefs, you accept them blindly.
“Even Luther, Calvin and Zwingli recognized that Mary was a perpetual virgin. Read their testimonies.:
Which means nothing. They recovered so much truth - most importantly the Gospel. They were not perfect and were creatures of their times, like we all are. Perhaps they should have sought out evidence before proclaiming it :-)
Dear Salvation,
Another note to follow up:
Mary’s sister could have been Salome (see Matthew 27:55ff.; Mark 15:40ff.), the mother of John (the Gospel writer) and James. If this is true, Jesus, John, and James were cousins. As such, he was a logical person to assume responsibility for Mary’s care.
Perhaps Jesus’ physical half-brothers did not become believers until after His resurrection. It is not recorded as to when it happened. In either case, they weren’t named as being present at the crucifixion, so Christ could not speak to them at that moment.
That said, this is not any kind of proof that Jesus did not have other brothers or sisters. All we know from this passage is that they were not standing before Christ when He made provision for His mother’s care.
"If these things exist and you CAN’T prove them using evidence in an unbroken string from Apostle to Church Father, you are assuming."
The first question would be, is one assuming reasonably, or is one assuming unreasonably?
I have to start with this, because there are many lacunae in the history of the Chosen People of the OT. For instance, there were approx. 200 years between the book of Ecclesiastes (~1000 BC) and the prophets Joel and Amos (~800 BC), 400 years between Malachi (~400 BC) and Matthew (~45 AD). The book of Psalms, which is a hymnal collection, may have nearly a thousand-year gap between the first-written group and the last-written, from 1400 to 450 BC.(All these dates are necessarily approximate, because while the canon of scripture is indeed inspired, the placement of the books is not.)
Many more gaps of 50 years, 100 years or more could be attested by scholars. I’ll let them debate it among themselves as long as they don’t come to fisticuffs.
It is a reasonable assumption that the Chosen People were still existing, still praying and singing, and still carrying on some form of national and organized religious life during every period of their known history starting with Abraham (we can call this the Hermeneutic of Continuity).
On the other hand, it would be unreasonable to assume that there is no continuity, and that each of the OT books marks a disjuncture and a re-invention of Israelite existence. (Call this the Hermeneutic of Rupture.)
The same is true in the life of the Church. A reasonable examination of the texts is meaningful only if you realize that there is a cultural/historical personal transmission process underneath it. The texts outline, but do not comprehensively catalog, the cultural history behind them.
It's like looking at a chain of islands in the Pacific which look like separate peaks, but which are actually the tops of a single, submerged mountain range. I've had this experience looking at parts of the nearby Unaka range (Southern Appalachia) when the "hollers", valleys and coves were all shrouded with mist, so that it looked like there were separate mountain ridges floating in the sky. But they are in fact continuous at the base. Many ridges, one range.
I'd say there are two ways to establish the links you are looking for. One is archaeology (a method of discovery/recovery) and the other is continuity (a method of seamless, lived succession).
The first ones we want to look at are the earliest Church Fathers, (within two generations of the Twelve Apostles of Christ) --- also called the Apostolic Fathers since they were of the second generation after the Twelve, and taught by the Twelve.
FIRST CENTURY (writing before 100 AD)
The biggies are Clement of Rome, (died in 99 AD), who was a contemporary of the Apostles; and Ignatius of Antioch (d. 107 AD), a contemporary of most of the Apostles. In addition, the Didache (written sometime between 50-100 AD) is dated in the same generation as the writings of these Apostolic Fathers (Clement and Ignatius) although its author is unknown.
SECOND CENTURY (writing before 200 AD)
Polycarp of Smyrna (d. 155 AD), Justin Martyr (d. 165), Irenaeus (d. 202), Clement of Alexandria (d. 215(.
THIRD CENTURY (writing before 300 AD)
Shepherd of Hermas (early 200’s), Clement of Alexandria (d. 215).
Those are some of the visible mountain tops. Then you look at the base: the elements which are known, not because they are recovered, but because they have been continuously lived. That would be mostly liturgy and the things that separately comprise or surround liturgy: essentially, texts, hymns, and rubrics.
There’s a couple good introduction here Church History Though the Liturgy.
Plus, grab onto and study the Liturgy of St. James. This goes all the way back to James, the “brother” of the Lord and patriarch of the Jewish Christians of Jerusalem before the destruction of the Temple. First celebrated in around 60 AD, it is the oldest form of the Divine Liturgy used continuously, and still in actual Church use.
That’s enough for now. Looks like I'm outlining a dissertation?!
I am happy to answer this sort of question, because I never fail to learn something new that just delights me.
This may take you awhile. Happy Reading!
Why do you keep saying that? The Gospel explicitly says that "from then on, the disciple took Mary into his home."(see Jn 19:25-27).
But of course, assumptions remain assumptions when they are without evidence. In this discussion, which has been wide ranging, you are not bringing forth evidence that supports anything about Jesus' brothers and sisters, perpetual virginity or as far as I remember (long day) any other topic. In the end an assumption may be right or wrong, but it is not known which it is without evidence.
Obviously there were gaps in Hebrew revelation, but in the end, it was all inspired revelation that is augmented with non-inspired history and other sources. Those other sources are very, very interesting, but not inspired.
"Clement of Rome, (died in 99 AD), who was a contemporary of the Apostles; and Ignatius of Antioch (d. 107 AD)" OK, bring forth the evidence from these two sources and let's take a look! They wont change the utter absence of inspired evidence, but let's take a look.
From your St. James link: "This Liturgy is the oldest Eucharistic service in continual use. In its present form, it's believed to go back to the Fourth Century, and some variation of the Liturgy likely dates back much earlier, perhaps as early as 60 A.D. (making it older than much of the New Testament). It's classically ascribed to St. James, the Bishop of Jerusalem, and has special prayers for the Church at Jerusalem. and what we have here is probably pretty close to what a Jerusalem Christian would be praying on an ordinary Sunday in the early 300s."
Believed, Fourth Century, Likely dates back, perhaps as early, ascribed, is probably pretty close, in the early 300s.
Frankly, it is indeed interesting, but there are no Christian priests in the Church recorded in the New Testament as an office. There is no evidence of a belief in transubstantiation in the early church in Acts or the Epistles. For those reasons and the outright admission that there is not an unbroken chain between the NT church and this form of liturgy, it is not definitive. Much was obviously added in later centuries. Still, it is interesting.
In closing, I always appreciate your good spirit, despite our disagreements.
You seem to be using two different sets of criteria for determining the historical reliability of Scripture and Tradition. In particular, I noticed that you are skeptical of the authorship, provenance, and dating of the Liturgy of St. James, when the historic grounding for this Liturgy has the same kind of parameters as the historic evidence we have for -- for instance --- the Gospels and Epistles of the NT.
Note here that I am not saying that the Liturgies are equal in authority nor that they are inspired in the same sense as the books of the NT. I am just saying that the bibliographic information is just as good, just as accurate (or inaccurate!) if you judge them by the same criteria.
Plus, a position of “Scripture yes, Tradition no” is self-contradictory, since Scripture comes to us from, and is identified to us by, Tradition.
Let me use just one plain and obvious example: the naming and authorship of Biblical books.
As you probably know, many Biblical books do not carry within them (within the text) who the author is, or the date of its publication. Obviously a few do. Some start out like this: (Hosea 1:1) "The word of the Lord that came to Hosea son of Beeri...", and Joel, Micah and Zephaniah begin in a similar manner. But for most of the rest of them we are relying on Rabbinical Tradition at a later date -- or Patristic Tradition at a MUCH later date --- to decide of the title and/authorship of books which are not attested in the scroll itself.
It's only according to Rabbinic tradition that the five books of the Torah were written by Moses. Yet most Christians and Jews accept these as “the Books of Moses.” And it’s only tradition dating from at least the 2nd century AD (!) that asserts that what we now call the Book of Joshua was by Joshua, and the Book of Judges and the Books of Samuel were by the prophet Samuel. But many of the books have no human author indicated, and in some, the “given” human author is clearly disputable. (E.g. Isaiah, which contains a sequence of pre-exilic, exilic and post-exilic material spanning almost 3 centuries: virtually no one maintains that the entire book, or even most of it, was written by one person – the 8th century BC prophet Isaiah ben Amoz.)
All of the Gospels were anonymous. Anonymous! But the "settled" idea of their authorship by "Matthew," "Mark," "Luke", and "John" rests entirely upon oral tradition and the early Fathers. And then there’s the still hotly disputed questions of, “Who really wrote 2 Thessalonians? or 2 Peter? Or the Epistle to the Hebrews?”
I could go on, but I need not for you to get my point. We rely on Tradition to grasp, as well as we can, who the authors of these books were, and in what time frames, and under what conditions (Autographic? Dictated to scribes? Collected and redacted from previous materials?)
So I’m dissatisfied by the way you so briskly brush away major chunks of Christian Tradition (like the Liturgy of St. James) which are, paleographically, just as solidly established as the Epistle of St. James..
As I said, it’s actually incoherent to set Sacred Tradition at odds with Sacred Scripture, since the fact that the physical Bible exists at all is entirely, 100% dependent on Tradition--- which is to say, human transmission. If it were not for human composition, editing, copying, collection, distribution, canonization, translation and publication, the Bible on your bedside table or mine would simply not exist. Though it is the inspired Word of God, it did not drop down from the sky, The inspiration is heavenly. The way it got to us, is exactly what we mean by “Scriptural Tradition.”
It's a good discussion! Thanks for the to-ing and fro-ing.
G’Night, my friend! Blessing in tagline.
O.K....I knew that the church was wrong and that you were right all along......well maybe not
the Orthodox church came about around 1054 AD, until then there were Catholics and heretics (within the Christian picture)...read up on the Eastern Schism!
“You seem to be using two different sets of criteria for determining the historical reliability of Scripture and Tradition.”
I don’t believe we’ve discussed the criteria for determining the historical reliability of Scripture.
“In particular, I noticed that you are skeptical of the authorship, provenance, and dating of the Liturgy of St. James, when the historic grounding for this Liturgy has the same kind of parameters as the historic evidence we have for — for instance -— the Gospels and Epistles of the NT.”
It isn’t that I am skeptical. The very article you had me read was as uncertain as could be. I pointed out every phrase from just one or two paragraphs. So, if they can’t accurately date it, I sure can’t. In other words, there is no definite historical link. It is obvious it has been altered over the centuries, as the author readily admitted.
“Plus, a position of “Scripture yes, Tradition no” is self-contradictory, since Scripture comes to us from, and is identified to us by, Tradition.”
I understand why, as a RC, you would believe that, while at the same time condemning those who questioned the canonicity of every choice the RC made. I don’t mean you personally condemning, but the RC in general and frequently condemned here. Yet the fact that the extensive criteria that was used then can be used now is important. It isn’t just historical criteria, but obviously a wrong date or false history could eliminate a choice. Some books were eliminated for those reasons and others in the non RC canon.
“As you probably know, many Biblical books do not carry within them (within the text) who the author is, or the date of its publication. Obviously a few do. Some start out like this: (Hosea 1:1) “The word of the Lord that came to Hosea son of Beeri...”, and Joel, Micah and Zephaniah begin in a similar manner. But for most of the rest of them we are relying on Rabbinical Tradition at a later date — or Patristic Tradition at a MUCH later date -— to decide of the title and/authorship of books which are not attested in the scroll itself.”
There is truth in what you wrote and frankly, we do not know the exact basis upon which God guided those who recognized the Hebrew Books as inspired. Yet God worked.
“It’s only according to Rabbinic tradition that the five books of the Torah were written by Moses.”
No problem. Knowing with 100% accuracy isn’t necessary in this case and again, we do not know exactly how God guided the process.
All of the Gospels were anonymous. Anonymous! But the “settled” idea of their authorship by “Matthew,” “Mark,” “Luke”, and “John” rests entirely upon oral tradition and the early Fathers.”
And that belief was one important criteria used in choosing the canon.
“We rely on Tradition to grasp, as well as we can, who the authors of these books were, and in what time frames, and under what conditions (Autographic? Dictated to scribes? Collected and redacted from previous materials?)”
Yet that was one criteria. Just one.
“So I’m dissatisfied by the way you so briskly brush away major chunks of Christian Tradition (like the Liturgy of St. James) which are, paleographically, just as solidly established as the Epistle of St. James..”
BUT THEY ARE NOT EQUAL TO James in authority. And once you have a canon, you are not deciding if it is true. You have it. As I pointed out, the Liturgy is no certain thing as a reflection of what happened in 60 ad among Christians in the new church. It is a crapshoot. It is not inspired. It is not authoritative. It is interesting.
“As I said, it’s actually incoherent to set Sacred Tradition at odds with Sacred Scripture, since the fact that the physical Bible exists at all is entirely, 100% dependent on Tradition-— which is to say, human transmission.”
Again, I can understand your POV, but I see absolutely no such conflict - and I point out that the inspired Scriptures were not 100% dependent on Tradition. I disagree completely with that point. I reject that tradition = human transmission.
“If it were not for human composition, editing, copying, collection, distribution, canonization, translation and publication, the Bible on your bedside table or mine would simply not exist.”
I can go this far: God chose to use what you listed to give us His Word. He could have accomplished His purpose through any way He chose. Had He not done the first, He would have used a different purpose. We see His message delivered by angels, by a disembodied hand writing on a wall, a talking ass, etc.
“It’s a good discussion! Thanks for the to-ing and fro-ing.”
Agreed. As I said, I always appreciate your spirit and consider you a sister in Christ.
Blessings back.
Pope Leo had died, and the pretended excommunication of the Patriarch by the Pope’s legates was illegal and a usurpation. That heresy by the Latin church marked the withdrawal of the Latin church from the realm of virtue and truth.
Pope Paul VI recognized the error of the Latin Church when he nullified the illegal acts of the pretended representatives of the Latin Church of 1054, in conjunction with the Ecumenical Patriarch.
Many non-believers have questioned the actuality of Jesus, saying that no one ever found hard evidence he existed.
No one can doubt that he had family—and it’s a certainty that the family would have been buried in the traditional Jewish fashion of that era.
It seems to me that archeological evidence of this kind is a literal “Godsend” to all Christians.
Anyone wanting further reading on the subject might read “The Jesus Dynasty” by Dr. James Tabor of the University of North Carolina. He was also involved in the initial investigation of the so-called Talpiot Tomb.
Try his website www.JesusDynasty.com
(BTW, I do think that my brain is getting slower and fuzzier, so if I misconstrue your major points, I won't mind being corrected. OK. Now I'll plunge in. Batten down the hatches.)
"It isn’t that I am skeptical. The very article you had me read was as uncertain as could be."
I see your point. But wouldn't the same objection apply to, for instance, the Epistle of St. James? We don't know who the author is: James son of Alphaeus? James son of Zebedee? James son of Joseph ("the brother of the Lord")? Does James son of Alphaeus = James the son of Mary Cleophas? Or is the work pseudographical, a collection of different authors writing under the patronage of the Church of Jerusalem headed by James?
James "the Just" was martyred in 62 AD. If he wrote it, it would have been written before that year (duh); but some scholars cite strong reasons why it was probably written in the last years of the 1st, or early 2nd century; and the earliest existing manuscripts of James are mid-to-late third century.
So we don't know who wrote it, and don't know when it was written.
As early as the 4th century, some voices here and there were doubting that it was written by an Apostle, that it was canonical, or that it was doctrinally sound, particularly as regards the doctrine of justification. 1200 years later, Martin Luther raised these same objections.
Long way of saying: I think Martin Luther and the various critics were wrong. Why? I am satisfied that the Epistle is legit, because it was accepted and received into the actual practice of the Church; I am likewise satisfied that the Liturgy of St. James is legit, and for exactly the same reason: because it was accepted and received into the actual practice of the Church.
It is the practice of the Church as a whole --- the sensus fidelium---which guarantees the authenticity of the texts, because the Holy Spirit is guiding the Church--- as Jesus repeatedly promised. I trust Him on this one.
Does that mean that every human act of every crapulous Renaissance pope was impeccable (without sin)? Of course not. Ha. (Again I say, Ha.) It just means that the Church as a whole will not be led into formal doctrinal error. We're thinking with the Church, the Bride of Christ, in union with Our Lord the Holy Spirit. With due respect to Martin Luther, these things are not up for grabs.
(It reminds me of a former Cuban neighbor's exclamation when viewing the "chaos and anarchy" of her kids' unkempt bedroom:
"La Iglesia in manos de Lutero!""The Church in the hands of Luther!"
"...In other words, [for the Liturgy of St. James] there is no definite historical link."
That is way too sweeing a conclusion, even considering the uncertainties of authorship, dating and provenance. Even if the Liturgy dates from the 4th century and not the 1st, it's what the Church of Jerusalem at least from the 4th century accepted as legit, as "from the Apostles," without liturgical improprieties nor doctrinal errors. We know of no objection from the rest of the patriarchal Churches, Alexandria, Damascus, Constantinople, Rome, anywhere.
If the Council of Nicaea, for instance, had said "The Liturgy used in Jerusalem is screwy and that place is a hotbed of heresy," then it would be a different story.
"Yet the fact that the extensive criteria that was used then can be used now is important. It isn’t just historical criteria, but obviously a wrong date or false history could eliminate a choice."
Obviously? That depends. Some inaccuracies are not that important: they just show human error. Consider Acts 5, where Luke writes of the Pharisee Gamaliel's speech in around AD 35-40, yet it refers to Theudas' revolt of AD 46-47 as a past event. And Gamaliel says that "Judas the Galilean" raised a revolt which followed that of Theudas - but Judas' revolt was in AD 6 or 7! We know these dates from Josephus and other records.
But... so? I would not throw out the Acts of the Apostles for that reason. Maybe Luke got it mixed up. Maybe Gamaliel got it mixed up. Maybe there were different revolutionaries also named "Theudas" and "Judas the Galilean," in different generations, whom we don't know about. Basically, it involves no error in faith and morals, so it really doesn't bother me.
The (well-known in some Evangelical circles) Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman has found a zillion of these kinds of discrepancies of detail. For instance, he was much perturbed by Jesus talking about David entering the Temple "when Abiathar was High Priest" (Mark 2:26) when, according to 1 Samuel, David did this when Ahimelech was high priest. Ehrman was so anguished: did Mark get it wrong? Did Samuel get it wrong? Did Jesus get it wrong? It drove him right into the arms of the atheists, poor man.
I say: Get a grip, Bart. It's de minimis. Nobody's faith depends on whether Abiathar or Ahimelech was High Priest.
" No problem. Knowing with 100% accuracy isn’t necessary in this case and again, we do not know exactly how God guided the process."
Exactly!
" And once you have a canon, you are not deciding if it is true. You have it."
Ah, brother, I wish it were so! If it were, your Bible wouldn't be ..umm... 7 books slenderer... than most Bibles! :o)
"I reject that tradition = human transmission."
This may be a sho-nuff definition problem, and the responsibility for that is probably mine because I did not approach the discussion systematically, by putting a discussion of definitions out there first and trying to get a shared understanding. It's a frequent problem in this kind of forum: people club each other over the head repeatedly before they realize that they actually have been using words in different senses.
I am using the word "tradition" (small "t") in the broadest sense of "everything that is handed down" (tra=across, ducire=to hand over, to convey). Not necessarily authoritative or inspired.
I am using the word Tradition (big "T") as a synonym for "the deposit of Faith" handed down from the Apostles.
In this sense, there are two divisions of big-T Tradition: Oral Tradition and Written Tradition. Oral Tradition would be what people heard from the Apostles, repeated, taught others in their turn, and imitated. (Paul: "be imitators of me as I am of Christ.") It's the content of the Apostolic preaching and teaching and example, put into practice. Written Tradition would be a synonym for the Sacred Scriptures. Both forms are authoritative: what the Apostles preached and what they wrote (and the way they lived their lives.)
I might not have been using these terms carefully or consistently enough--- which means mushy thinking on my part --- and for this I would ask your patient forbearance.
"I can go this far: God chose to use what you listed to give us His Word. He could have accomplished His purpose through any way He chose. Had He not done the first, He would have used a different purpose. We see His message delivered by angels, by a disembodied hand writing on a wall, a talking ass, etc."
We are in total agreement on that!!
I've got to go scrub a burned pot.
See you later, 'tater.
Oh, and get this (tagline):
I will remind you that the church has every motive to lie to you to keep their income stream rolling.
I have serve only the truth.
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