well, I most admit, my hands hurt like crazy from typing. In addition, I played 18 holes of golf both Saturday and Sunday so my hands are indeed numb!.
Ok, so you we can at least agree that Trent was the final definition and as I said, the “Most definitive” and thus while the term infallible was not used, in essence it was an infallible definition for as the current Cathechism states, repeating in essence what Trent said, “The Complete list is called the canon of scripture” [CCC 120]. Still, there indeed definitions of the Canon well before that were the same canon that Trent “infallibly” and “Definitively” defined. So Trent finally put the issue to rest and yes there was debate but every time there was a debate going back to the late 4th century, the canon defined at Trent was the canon that was defined every time before it going back to the 4th century.
As for Pope Damasus, can we now agree that there indeed was a Council in Rome that meet circa 382AD, per the Canons and Letters from the Council of Constantinople. So these internet so called protestant apologist posting on their blogs no such Council happened is incorrect. I will take a measure of goodwill and assume out of ignorance, not hatred of Catholicism. Now as for the Decree-Tome of Pope Damasus, two of my Catholic sources, both recent, Fr. Jurgens Faith of the Early Fathers, Volumes 1-3, published in 1979. In his Introductory Notes on the Council of Constantinopile, he states that a Doctrinal Tome drawn up at the Council is not extant [I think in Greek], although there are some who believe that 23 Doctrinal ananathemas in an Arabic Collection are likely from that Council. Jurgens notes (p.398 of Volume 1] that those Arabic 23 anathemas’ are identical to the 23 in the Tome of Damasus. Still, the exact link between the Arabic 23 anathamas and Damasus Tome has not yet been directly established. However the canons from that Council, which were in Greek, are extant.
Jurgens in his Introductory notes on Pope Damasus and his Tome and Decrees notes that the Tome of Damasus is in fact a work from the Council of Rome (382AD). He notes in this Introduction that the 23 Arabic anathamas are likely a summary of the Doctrinal tome drawn up at the Council of Constantinopile in 381AD and this Arabic summary is again, identical to the Tome of Damasus. Now, in addition to the Letter that notes a Council going on in Rome under Damasus. In addition, Canon 1 of the Council of Constantinopile in 382 [preserved erroneously as Canon 5 in the 381 Council] refers to a reception of a Tome from the Western Church. If we conclude, as it seems likely, that this Tome was from Damasus, along with the 3 Decrees, and these were sent from Rome in 382 to the Council in Constantinople meeting that same year to respond to the arrogance of the Council in 381 [for example, Decree 3 mentions that Constantinople making itself 2nd in Primacy is a violation of the Council of Nicea Canon 6 and it reiterates that Due to the connection to Saint Peter, Rome, Alexandria and Antioch hold the 3 highest primacies], it becomes easy to account for the Arabic collection of anathemas, which are almost identical to the ones of Pope Damasus, and which as noted, were presented as part of the Council of Constantinople in 381.
Jurgens continues and states that if the Tome of Damasus was sent to Council being held in 382, when the canons of that council became mixed with the canons Council of Constantinopile in 381, it could easily have happened that the Tome of Damasus also became attached to the Acts of that Council of 381AD and when translated into Arabic, the impression would be that the anathemas of the Tome of Damasus belonged to the Acts of Constantinople 381 Tome.
As a quick note, the Tome of Damasus anathemizes Sabellius and his error, Arius and then the Macedonians, who were the ones that the Council of Constantinople were meeting about. They were questioning the Divinity of the Holy Spirit. For example Tome 16 states “If anyone does not say the Holy Spirit is truly and properly of the Father, just as the Son, of the Divine substance and true God, he is a heretic” Tome17 states “If anyone does not say that the Holy Spirit can do all things, knows all, and is everywhere, just as the Father and Son, he is a heretic. Tome 18, If anyone says the Holy Spirit is a creature, or He was made by the Son, he is a heretic. Tome 20 states “If anyone does not say of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, that here is one Godhead, one strength, majesty, power, glory, he is a heretic. Tome 21 states, If anyone does not say that there are Three Persons of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, equal, always living, embracing all things visible and invisible, ruling all...He is a heretic.
Again, citing Schaff, he notes that we still have extant portions of the Tome of Damasus which contain anathemas. The Decrees, the first 3 are extant to Damasus [Fr. Jurgens (1979) and New Jerome Biblical Commentary (1990), although there was some editing to them done by Pope Gelasius who in a Council at Rome in 494, published the works of the Church Fathers in a volume, listed heretical books and attached a canonical list, but as the New Advent article on Pope Gelasius notes, this work was done most likely by Pope Damasus [note this is from the Catholic Encyclopedia published in the early 20th century].
Again, see Schaff’s notes on the COuncil of Constantinople and the Tome of the Western Church, which he does attribute to Pope Damasus
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.ix.viii.vi.html
Scaff also describes why the Council of Constantinople was not viewed as an Ecumenical Council in the West until much later. Even then, only the Creed was accepted, not the canons. The canon at hand was Constantinople making itself 2nd in the rank of the Primacy. Jurgens again mentions the 3 Decrees which are extant. The 1st Decree deals with the Holy Spirit, which the Tome deals with exclusively. The 2nd one, dealing with the canon of Scripture has been known as the opening part of the Gelasian Decree, but Jurgens notes that it is commonly held that that part of the Gelasian decree is now an authentic work of the Council of Rome in 382, not the Council held in 494 under Pope Gelasius and then with respect to Decree 3 which reiterates the Primacies as defined in Canon 6 of Nicea, Jurgens clearly attaches it to Pope Damasus, not Pope Gelasius.
I think a couple of reasons, 1 with respect to the Canon Decree (#2), the canon in the West was not a major issue at the time of Pope Gelasius. With Pope Innocent I’s Letter and the work of Saint Augustine and the North African Councils, confirmed by Pope Boniface, the canon in the West never really surfaced as an issue that needed Papal Letters or Councils again till the Council of Basle-Florence in 1442 when the Catholics and Orthodox tried to restore communion and of course Trent. Decree 3 [Primacy of Rome, Alexandria and Antioch and now Constantinople putting itself as 2] makes sense in the context of being around 382 given in 381, this was the first time Constantinople in 381 challenged Canon 6 of Nicea. By the end of the 5th century when Pope Gelasius was Bishop of Rome, this issue would not be dealt with the way it was written in the 4th under Damasus. By that time, Constantinople at Chalcedon did it again so that letter, in the way it was written fits the 4th century, not the late 5th.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.ix.viii.x.html
No golfing (maybe football) for me or playing games on Sunday, but my fingers are increasingly stiff due to arthritis, so that my fingers do hardly move independently, usually resulting in multiple typos per sentence and little touch typing, so it takes awhile, long with mental fatigue. But God looks at what one does with what he has, (2Cor. 8:12) and thus the Lord's commendation, "she hath done what she could," (Mk. 4:8) not that i all have, and can multiply what we offer Him. (Mt/. 14:17-21) Now to always have that attitude.
Ok, so you we can at least agree that Trent was the final definition
So we can at least agree that Trent "was the first infallible and effectually promulgated pronouncement on the Canon, addressed to the Church Universal.” (Catholic Encyclopedia, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03267a.htm)
And that doubt and disagreement continued down thru the centuries and right into Trent , so that Luther was not a maverick in his non-binding present judgment on the canon, and which, as with church "fathers," was part of his theological development. The page to see on Luther and the canon is here , while Protestantism did not follow him as a pope even in regards to his canon.
In any case, even if you had an "infallible" canon from the 4th century under a pope who employed a murderous gang in seeking to secure his papal seat, of what import is this? The issue is the very premise of the assured veracity of Rome. Regarding this, the more foundational issues which we do not both agree on is that,
1. Scripture materially provides for the magisterial office as an indispensable part of the visible church, yet an assuredly infallible magisterium is not essential for providence and assurance of truth, including discerning both writings and men of God as being so, and preservation of faith.
2. Being the instrument, steward and discerner of both writings and men of God and inheritors of promises or God's presence, guidance and preservation, does not require or promise assured infallibility.
3. The laity can be right while the magisterium is wrong, and God often provides and preserves Truth by raising up men from with the magisterium to reprove it.
4. Both writings and men of God are what they are regardless of whether the powers that be - which are sppsd to affirm them as being so - do so or not.
5. While conciliar decrees are proper in affirming both writings and men as being of God, the establishment of such is essentially due to their unique and enduring heavenly qualities and attestation. (Ps. 19:7-11)
6. Scripture is the supreme transcendent standard for testing and est. Truth claims, as it is abundantly evidenced to be.
7. OT Scripture materially provided for the recognition of both Christ and additional conflative complementary writings, and thus for a canon.
As for Pope Damasus, can we now agree that there indeed was a Council in Rome that meet circa 382AD, per the Canons and Letters from the Council of Constantinople. So these internet so called protestant apologist posting on their blogs no such Council happened is incorrect.
I have not followed this, as i thought GPH was dealing with it, and despite all the attention you give it, it is not a critical issue in the light of the above, and the fact that scholarly doubts and disagreement continued, as no infallible definition was provided. But as far as i know the charge is not that Council in Rome did not exist, but that the Gelasian decree was a later work.
“What is commonly called the Gelasian decree on books which are to be received and not received takes its name from Pope Gelasius (492-496). It gives a list of biblical books as they appeared in the Vulgate, with the Apocrypha interspersed among the others. In some manuscripts, indeed, it is attributed to Pope Damasus, as though it had been promulgated by him at the Council of Rome in 382. But actually it appears to have been a private compilation drawn up somewhere in Italy in the early sixth century. (Source: F.F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture [Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 1988], p. 97)
Lacking a written formal record of the proceedings at the Council of Rome, it seems there is a lot of historical speculation about the decree of the Canon by Damasus.
. Now as for the Decree-Tome of Pope Damasus, two of my Catholic sources, both recent, Fr. Jurgens Faith of the Early Fathers, Volumes 1-3, published in 1979.
I have not read him, but have seen his integrity impugned for allegedly for passing along forged and fake documents as if they were real or due to misuse of using partial statements of major Church fathers, interpreting them as supportive of papal primacy.
Yet he also affirms such thing as that Gregory the Great (a doctor of the Church and bishop of Rome from A.D. 590-604) met Bishop Leander of Seville about the year 578, who asked him to write a commentary on the Book of Job, which he completed in thirty-five books about the year 595 A.D. (The Faith of the Early Fathers (Collegeville: Liturgical, 1979), Volume III, p. 313.)
But in which pope Gregory denied canonical status to 1 Maccabees [stating the position of the Church of his day] long after the Councils of Hippo and Carthage:
With reference to which particular we are not acting irregularly, if from the books, though not Canonical , yet brought out for the edification of the Church, we bring forward testimony. Thus Eleazar in the battle smote and brought down an elephant, but fell under the very beast that he killed (1 Macc. 6.46). (Joseph Gildea, Gregory the Great, A Synthesis of Moralia in Job (New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 1991, Part 1, Book 3, p. 126.)
Of course, this is just one example of how unsettled the canon was until Trent.
And Jurgens favors Augustine over all others.
If we were faced with the unlikely proposition of having to destroy completely either the works of Augustine or the works of all the other Fathers and Writers, I have little doubt that all the others would have to be sacrificed. Augustine must remain. Of all the Fathers it is Augustine who is the most erudite, who has the most remarkable theological insights, and who is effectively most prolific (William Jurgens, The Faith of the Early Fathers (Collegeville: Liturgical, 1979), Vol. 3, p. 1).
Yet faced with support from him for Reformed views, Augustine has been treated with scorn by other RC apologists.
Again, see Schaff’s notes on the COuncil of Constantinople and the Tome of the Western Church, which he does attribute to Pope Damasus
But as re the Decretal of Gelasius, later the Journal of Theological Studies 14 (1913) finds , "The proof that the document is not a real Decretal of Gelasius or any other Pope is almost as decisive, if not quite so startling....
But as said, the very premise of an infallible magisterium being essential for the providence and assurance of Truth, and that Rome is it (thus her canon must be held), is the real issue.