The Protestant Achilles' Heel

“However, you have not provided an argument as to why the reasoning is false.”

The Bible doesn’t teach a single one of the things claimed. That is why. It isn’t taught.

The article is no different than seeing ponies in the clouds. They may look like ponies, but they remain clouds.

"We also find that the words spoken by Jesus to his mother were kept in her heart (Lk 2:51). Jesus came to fulfill the law. The law was contained in the Ark as Jesus was contained in Mary. When Mary goes to visit Elizabeth, it is her voice that announces the presence of Jesus to John the Baptist. "

More imaginative wresting of the Scriptures. This is made up out of whole cloth.

Mary is not the "new ark".

There is no new ark.

The one and only ark is now in heaven.

"Then God's temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant. And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm."

Mary was a very honored woman to be chosen by God's graciousness to bear Messiah. Do not make her more than God did. She deserves better than to be made into an idol or demigoddess.

The difference between you and Christ is that Christ was infallible, you are not either.

So that leaves you in no position to pass judgment on anything, the very thing you are condemning CB for.

The Lord’s will be done. Maybe it will deter the Global Warming worshipers up here.

Cost of heat was 210.00 this last month in this apt. at about 62 inside. Praying for warm weather next. Though here that usually comes with precipitation.

Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

Now read your tagline ronnie.

I’m not picky.

I’d take rain any day, after it goes above freezing so everything isn’t encased in a block of ice.

The first Adam addresses Eve as woman.
The last Adam addresses Mary as woman.
Logical Conclusion:Mary is the last Eve.

The problem with that syllogism is exclusivity of the conclusion, i.e., the premises do not force the conclusion. Consider:

Premise 1: Adam calls Eve Woman
Premise 2: Jesus calls Mary Woman

Do you notice the problem? Syllogisms are a mechanism for locking down exclusive solution sets. We want to be able at the end to say, "and no other solutions are possible." Can we really say that here? No. Adam the First and Jesus both belong to the category "Adam." So we agree on that term as the unified category "Adam" for purposes of this inquiry..

But now comes the hard part. Eve and Mary are the terms about which we wish to draw a conclusion. You imagine Eve to be a transferable category as Adam was. That is an assumption that itself would need proving. But assuming for argument such a category exists, you still need to get Mary into that category. And that's a problem, because although we know Eve is Eve the First, by identity, we cannot assume Mary is Eve the Second. That is the very point we wish to prove, and we must prove it by finding it to be the only possible way to reconcile premises 1 and 2. Put another way, if any other solutions are possible, the result is considered equivocal, i.e., not proof. You need to lock it down to one solution, or the syllogism fails to say what you want it to say.

So, what are the possible solutions? The most obvious reason Adam categorized Eve as woman is because she was a woman. So that kind of goes nowhere. Yes, she is a woman. At the time she was the only woman, so expressions like "the woman you gave me" make perfect sense. So far we are looking at strict fact. Nothing mystical. Just Adam talking about a woman because she was one. Can you see where I'm going to go next?

Why did Jesus call Mary woman? What are the reasonable possibilities? Is it possible He did so for some reason other than to establish an association with Eve, as you theorize? We note that Jesus addressed other women besides Mary, and in each recorded case except two, He called them "Woman."

1. The woman who anointed His feet (note the address here is indirect):

When Jesus understood it, he said unto them, Why trouble ye the woman? for she hath wrought a good work upon me.
(Matthew 26:10)

2. The woman He healed from a longstanding disease (here the address is direct):

And, behold, there was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself. And when Jesus saw her, he called her to him, and said unto her, Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity.
(Luke 13:11-12)

3. The Samaritan woman (also direct address):

Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.
(John 4:21)

As one exception, the woman healed from the issue of blood He called daughter:

For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole. But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour.
(Matthew 9:21-22)

The other exception is also the only time Jesus is ever recorded as addressing a woman by name, and He was not speaking to His mother, but to Mary Magdalene:

The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre.
(John 20:1)
......
Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master.
(John 20:16)

These demonstrate that it was customary and usual for Jesus to directly address a woman as "woman." Therefore, one cannot conclude from the use of "woman" alone that He meant anything other than His usual and customary way of addressing women.

So, to get to your "proof," you need to unpack the extra hidden premise sandwiched in between your two original premises. And this gets to the root of why your logic fails to prove your conclusion:

Premise 1: Adam calls Eve Woman
Premise 1.1 : Jesus only uses Woman when addressing Eve-category women.
Premise 2: Jesus calls Mary Woman
Conclusion: Therefore Mary belongs to the Eve-category.

As we have demonstrated from Scripture, implied Premise 1.1 is false. Jesus uses "woman" to address women in general. His use of the term provides no evidence of some interior motive, other than ordinary address, and under the rule of Occam's Razor, the simplest solution that works is probably correct. He called them women, including Mary, because that is what they were. What could be more simple than that?

But your logic has further problems. I have granted you your theoretical Eve-as-category for the sake of argument, but it too is unjustified. There is in Scripture a justification for speaking of both a First and Last Adam.

And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
(1 Corinthians 15:45)

And so we have direct textual justification for an Adamic category that prefigures Christ. No such equivalent exists for Eve. This was a decision of the Holy Spirit in providing us with Holy Scripture, and it is dangerous presumption to ignore it. There is no warrant to assume Eve prefigures anyone or anything. Therefore, yet another hidden premise, that there is such a category, assumes facts not in evidence, and should be rejected as speculation until and unless solid, unequivocal proof can be offered.

Which gets us to the true difference between eisogesis and exegesis. "Reading something into the text" (eisogesis) is something we all do. It is instinctive, and it is dangerous. The best defense against it, intellectually speaking, is to hold ourselves to a high standard of proof for the things we believe. The premises must lead inevitably to the conclusion, or else the conclusion cannot be considered binding. There are many areas of doctrine where the syllogisms do form solid, exclusive conclusions, such as would bind the Christian conscience, and require our belief. The Trinity is one of those solid inferential conclusions. Getting Eve out of "Woman" is a bridge too far, as demonstrated above. When the conclusion posits new information that is not compelled by well formed premises, that is eisogesis. Exegesis is nothing more than the art of truing the conclusions to their supporting premises.

But if that was all there was to it, we'd all agree on everything. Unfortunately, we also know there is a spiritual dimension. One can bring all the logic in the universe to bear, but without the aid of the Holy Spirit, not just for the teacher, but for each and every student of the word of God, that logic will not move the understanding to the place it should be. Having the Holy Spirit is not optional for the believer. But in having Him indwell us, we are assured that at some point, we will hear His voice, and will not listen to false shepherds. And so in the end we do not put our faith in logic, but in Christ, to lead us to the right understanding.

Peace,

SR

+1

The polio has left me in a condition which would cause be to be house bound until spring in that climate.

Sorry that you struggle, but glad you find God's grace in your infirmity, which we all have to varying degrees. The devil wants us to follow the counsel of Job's wife, so that he may gain glory, and i have too much believed his faithless lies and react accordingly, but i also reason how can we be conquers/overcomers unless we have that to overcome?

God is for us, and knows of our troubles in this race as Christ endured the like, and walks with us thru it, and will make it all worth when we see Him, whose coming and deliverance we are to look to, which will be sweeter due to the suffering we endured in faith.

And our hope of you is stedfast, knowing, that as ye are partakers of the sufferings, so shall ye be also of the consolation. (2 Corinthians 1:7)

I have been meaning to get back to your post, but didn’t have time to for a few days so it ended up getting pushed to the side for a bit.

No, those who believe in some form of sola scriptura don’t hate the Catholic Church, and that’s not where the criticisms of it come from. I came to know and understand the Bible first and was neutral about RCC teaching then. But as time went on I came to see more and more how it was in error. And those conclusions weren’t arrived at in knee-jerk reaction, superficially, but in serious consideration and humility, with the thought that the intial appearance of error doesn’t mean there’s error. It takes a lot of examination to reach those conclusions. Seeking to discern what’s true according to God is not in any way a light matter.

One thing about Catholic apologetics is that when both ordinary Catholics and so many of the clergy do it, they tend to not mention that sources like a Catholic encyclopedia (for example, newadvent.org) will say that there isn’t conclusive proof from the Bible for a Catholic teaching. Yet, Catholics will so very often argue just that sort of thing, that by Scripture alone, even independent of Catholic tradition, the Catholic teaching is proven true. But in actuality, they are attempting to use Scripture and Catholic tradition to prove Catholic tradition’s interpretation of Scripture. Not the same thing. That’s actually saying that Catholic tradition teaches something, and you can also make a case for it from the Bible, so therefore Scripture itself says Catholic teaching is correct.

But this thinking, so common in Catholic apologetics, violates proper logic. Proper logic goes:

All bassett hounds are dogs.
Spot is a bassett hound.
Therefore, Spot is a dog.

But this is very often Catholic reasoning on things:
All dogs are beagles.
Spot is a dog.
Therefore, Spot is a beagle!

Spot could be a beagle, because he’s a dog, but it’s a logical possibility, not a certainty, from that information. Yet Catholics will argue that because the Catholic Church says he’s a beagle, and the Bible indicates that it’s talking about a type of hound, and a beagle is a hound, that the Bible therefore proves he’s a beagle. That’s backward. The real questions that need to be answered are how the tradition truly formed, so that it can be shown to have been a faithful belief when it was, and if it is in accordance with Scripture. Much of doctrine can be implied, according to sola scriptura beliefs, but some measure of implication doesn’t make any old interpretation true.

The Bible tends to teach many of the same lessons over and over, often with new little points made here and there, and then even demonstrating how different lessons relate to each other. If you take a passage or even a few, and come up with an implied interpretation from them, it shouldn’t directly contradict major lessons from the Bible. Nor should an implied interpretation teach things that go beyond what the Bible has revealed.

That’s the case in Revelation 12. You will admit other possible meanings for the woman, but they’re actually trivial as the one and only interpretation that matters is that it’s Mary, to Catholic thinking. But although it is indeed reminiscent of her, again, other things about it don’t fit. And much is a deliberate mystery left by the Lord. I wholeheartedly believe He means it to be something that we partly but cannot fully grasp here. This “woman,” if she really is an actual woman, was apparently with child before Satan drew the fallen angels out of Heaven, and she appeared in Heaven and then later was on earth.

Really, though, the problem in discussing these things with many Catholics, to put the logic and sola scriptura issues another way, is that they look at it all through confirmation bias, so for the most part they simply can’t see the issues at hand, and the different implications of those issues that are involved. Rather than truly investigating in an impartial sense the claims of the Catholic Church, including on how doctrine was created, many Catholics go looking at the evidence merely to defend Catholicism. No true investigation is going on.

So, if that’s the case, the matters involved in Revelation 12 just can’t be grasped when such Catholic thinking is used. I see Revelation 12, and Revelation on the whole, as revealing a lot of things, but they’re wrapped in mysteries. Many answers are given, but maybe just as many questions are raised. And for now, that clearly seems to me what God’s will is for us, in how much we are to know. The grappling with what different things mean, without being able to come to definite conclusions, though, is good for us spiritually. It causes us to study and dwell on what different things might mean.

Then, for another example, if you take the Catholic doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, it didn’t really come along until relatively recently, and then it was optional at first, as some supported and some opposed it, and then it became a mandatory belief. If you read the Bible, and consider the very low priority given to the matter at the Church’s beginning, versus all that we can see that they gave high priority to, then just by that the whole issue must be seen as a distraction, something to pull the attention of Christians away from far more important matters.

On implied doctrine, then, what should be considered is how something is implied. Is the Trinity just something barely mentioned one time, that Scripture is inconclusive about? No, over and over again, with support from the Old Testament, too, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are clearly described. The Trinity is never identified and defined, but it clearly demonstrated for us. And, considering how much the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are spoken of in Scripture (they are virtually the entire focus of the New Testament, in one way, while in another mankind and Satan may also of course be considered as very important in the New Testament, too), then it is no far reach to accept the Trinity. It’s clearly there, and undeniably of the greatest importance. It’s also an implication that arises by itself, out of Scripture.

Your religion doesn't think things thru too much...

Haha well, let's just see what our "poor thinking", according to you, has produced:

From here: Nestorianism

We have no difficulty in defining the doctrine of Nestorius so far as words are concerned: Mary did not bring forth the Godhead as such (true) nor the Word of God (false), but the organ, the temple of the Godhead. The man Jesus Christ is this temple, "the animated purple of the King", as he expresses it in a passage of sustained eloquence. The Incarnate God did not suffer nor die, but raised up from the dead him in whom He was incarnate. The Word and the Man are to be worshipped together, and he adds: dia ton phorounta ton phoroumenon sebo (Through Him that bears I worship Him Who is borne). If St. Paul speaks of the Lord of Glory being crucified, he means the man by "the Lord of Glory". There are two natures, he says, and one person; but the two natures are regularly spoken of as though they were two persons, and the sayings of Scripture about Christ are to be appropriated some of the Man, some to the Word. If Mary is called the Mother of God, she will be made into a goddess, and the Gentiles will be scandalized.

...It will probably be only just to Nestorius to admit that he fully intended to safeguard the unity of subject in Christ. But he gave wrong explanations as to the unity, and his teaching logically led to two Christs, though he would not have admitted the fact. Not only his words are misleading, but the doctrine which underlies his words is misleading, and tends to destroy the whole meaning of the Incarnation. It is impossible to deny that teaching as well as wording which leads to such consequences as heresy. He was therefore unavoidably condemned. He reiterated the same view twenty years later in the "Bazaar of Heraclides", which shows no real change of opinion, although he declares his adherence to the Tome of St. Leo

It is for these reasons, especially those in bold, that his work was condemned heretical. Words mean things and unless the dogma (of the Trinity) is made clear, and all logical consequences thereof are rigorously defended, then the potential to slip back into old heresies remains. This is why Nestorius was condemned. Not because what he taught was antithetical to the dogma of the Trinity, but because the way he taught it (explained it) wrt Christ's personhood, it left it (the dogma of the Trinity) open to misunderstanding and therefore heretical interpretation. The fact he didn't recant on this point is a testiment to his pride, not a "political persecution". He was too proud in his work to disallow any correction to his explainations of Christ's personhood.

This is actually an excellent example of how titles given to Mary actually are educative about her son Jesus, and thus don't make her into some kind of "goddess" as Nestorius (and others here) feared and fear today. They (the titles) help describe her son more perfectly, thus glorify God, not Mary. Which is how it can be reasonably said that devotion to Mary is devotion to Christ because in every way, she points to Him.

But he gave wrong explanations as to the unity, and his teaching logically led to two Christs, though he would not have admitted the fact.

I had, like you, thought for a long time that Nestorius was a heretic. But the current body of evidence strongly suggests that Nestorius did NOT in fact advocate "two persons" in the person of Christ, that rather there was a systematic misunderstanding of technical terms between the parties which led to that erroneous conclusion. Please read the following article if you are interested in a detailed examination of the issue:

http://lukebray.wordpress.com/2010/06/02/nestorius-understanding-of-the-person-of-christ-34/

Bottom line, the two-nature/one-person formula of Chalcedon is the Nestorian formulation, not that of Nestorius' principal opponent, Cyril of Alexandria, whose solution tended toward the obscuring of the human nature of Jesus. In point of fact, the "winner" of the political contest was the true heretic. To ignore the difference in political skill between the two men, as if it were not a factor, is to miss a major part of the story. In the end, the dispute was "arbitrated" by invoking the Roman emperor against Nestorius, which is completely contrary to Paul's admonition that believers settle such disputes without appeal to human civil authorities. It invalidates the entire process.

That Nestorius maintained his innocence of heresy unto the end is not an act of pride, but an honest heart crying out for justice. There is talk even now of eventual reconciliation with the Nestorian churches, because the severity and injustice of the misunderstanding is in our day coming to full light. Nestorius' concern about the potential for abuse in "Theotokus" was the spark that ignited the controversy, and it was well grounded in an orthodox Christology. If territorial politics had not been a factor, if the Greek terminology noted in the link above had not interfered with good mutual understanding, and if the party for veneration of Mary had not been so bent on institutionalizing that veneration, I am confident the outcome would have been significantly different.

Peace,

SR