Posted on 08/15/2023 8:57:23 PM PDT by ebb tide
1. It's Not Taught in the Bible
Scripture certainly is a “standard of truth”, but not in a sense that rules out the binding authority of authentic apostolic tradition and the Church. Catholics agree with Protestants that Scripture is materially sufficient: i.e., every true doctrine can be found in the Bible, if only implicitly and indirectly by deduction. But no biblical passage teaches that Scripture is the sole rule of faith for the Christian (formal sufficiency). Nor can sola Scriptura be deduced from implicit passages.
2. “Word of God”
“Word” in Holy Scripture quite often refers to a proclaimed, oral word of prophets or apostles. They spoke the word of God, whether or not their utterances were later recorded in Scripture (see, e.g., Jer 25:3, 7-8). The oral “word” had equal authority. This was also true of apostolic preaching (1 Thess 2:13).
3. Tradition is Not a Dirty Word
The Bible condemns corrupt traditions of men (e.g., Matt 15:2-6, Mk 7:8-13, Col 2:8). Catholics agree with this. But it’s not the whole truth. True, apostolic traditions are also positively endorsed. These traditions are in total harmony with and consistent with Scripture. In that sense, Scripture is the “final judge” of tradition, but not in the sense that it rules out all binding tradition and Church authority (see, e.g., Acts 2:42; 1 Cor 11:2; 2 Thess 2:15; 2 Tim 1:13-14; 2:2; Jude 3).
4. Jesus and Paul Accepted Non-Biblical Oral and Written Traditions
Jesus and St. Paul accepted the authority of the Old Testament, but they also appealed to other authority, outside of written revelation. For example, ...
(Excerpt) Read more at ncregister.com ...
Peter was also the only Apostle, was called “Satan” by Jesus.
So, the Catholic church was founded by the only person we know Jesus ever called “Satan.”
Phone edit problems on that last one. Meant this:
Peter was also the only Apostle who was called “Satan” by Jesus.
So, the Catholic church was founded by the only person we know Jesus ever called “Satan.”
Job 19:25-27
Amen!
It’s like trying to reason with a group belonging to a deviant cult.
Is Jesus enough, or do we really need Francis?
Yes.
If you really want to know why others reject your belief in this area, ask nicely instead of throwing down the gauntlet.
I don't care to know, so I was not asking. I just want to post the Truth.
Others have posted truth here. Let the reader decide.
Then you need to be posting Scripture, and a WHOLE lot more of it than you do.
John 17:17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.
What with the "His" pronoun you go by?
Are you one of those who are gender confused?
Here's something, "His", can chew on:
13 Whereunto also he hath called you by our gospel, unto the purchasing of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. 14 Therefore, brethren, stand fast; and hold the traditions which you have learned, whether by word, or by our epistle. 2nd Epistle of St Paul to the Thessalonians
It's quite amusing to see you "sola scriptura" guys ignoring scripture when it doesn't agree with your erroneous beliefs.
I'll go with St. Paul over the heretic, Martin Luther, any day.
See post #69. Looking forward to seeing you reject the very scripture you hang your hat on.
Of course some Catholics disagree with the teachings of the Church. they can be very uncomfortable. As Jesus said we must carry our crosses.
That doesn’t alter the fact that the de Fide teachings of the Church have not changed. Some have been added as the Holy Ghost leads us to deeper understanding, but no fundamental teaching has been changed.
But we will continue to pray every day for our separated brethren.
Plainly wrong. First, "authentic apostolic tradition" is based upon the the novel and unScriptural premise of ensured perpetual magisterial veracity (EPMV) as per Rome which is nowhere seen or promised in Scripture (leading into all Truth" does not mean that). Thus EPMV itself flows from tradition, but it is another example or Catholic circularity.
Secondly, "authentic apostolic tradition" has as it corollary that of Jewish tradition, which the Orthodox also invoke today in rejecting Christ, but the Lord and His apostles never invoked tradition as being the supreme standard. And while men such as the apostles could speak as wholly inspired of God and provide new public revelation thereby, and thus call souls to hold fast to their tradition, Rome does not and cannot presumes its popes and ecumenical councils speak as wholly inspired of God.
But it is abundantly evidenced that as written, Scripture became the transcendent supreme standard for obedience and testing and establishing truth claims as the wholly Divinely inspired and assured, Word of God. And Scripture provided the epistemological doctrinal and prophetic foundation for the NT church, which it is grounded in and supports, being the support "of the Truth." Thus the veracity of even apostolic oral preaching could be subject to testing by Scripture, (Acts 17:11) and not vice versa.
For an authoritative body of wholly God-inspired writings had been manifestly established by the time of Christ as being "Scripture, ("in all the Scriptures") "even the tripartite canon of the Law, the Prophets and The Writings, by which the Lord Jesus established His messiahship and ministry and opened the minds of the disciples to, who did the same . (Luke 24:27.44,45; Acts 17:2; 18:28, etc.)
For God manifestly made writing His most-reliable means of authoritative preservation. (Exodus 17:14; 34:1,27; Deuteronomy 10:4; 17:18; 27:3,8; 31:24; Joshua 1:8; 2 Chronicles 34:15,18-19, 30-31; Psalm 19:7-11; 102:18; 119; Isaiah 30:8; Jeremiah 30:2; Matthew 4:5-7; 22:29; Luke 24:44,45; John 5:46,47; John 20:31; Acts 17:2,11; 18:28; Revelation 1:1; 20:12, 15;
[1b] Catholics agree with Protestants that Scripture is materially sufficient: i.e., every true doctrine can be found in the Bible, if only implicitly and indirectly by deduction. But no biblical passage teaches that Scripture is the sole rule of faith for the Christian (formal sufficiency). Nor can sola Scriptura be deduced from implicit passages.
SS actually includes the materially sense as regards sufficiency, but not as in Catholicism, (esp. RC) in which "The Church" asserts that written and oral tradition teach ensured perpetual magisterial veracity in formal teaching on faith and morals uniquely for their church, thus effectively validating its own claim, and thus if they claim the Assumption is a fact, then all are to believe it. But SS does teach material sufficiency in the sense that "what is "necessary for God's own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life, is either expressly set down in scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added [as public express revelation], whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men."
To which it adds that souls by "a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them" (necessary things). And that,
.".we acknowledge...that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature , and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed.” http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/ch_I.html
Thus while Scripture itself does not provide a full table of contents, yet since it is manifest that souls did discern both men and writings as being of God (as seen by John the baptizer being judged as a prophet and the establishment of what the Lord referred to as "all the Scripture" (Mark 11:32; Lk. 24:27) before there was a church, then thus by logical (Scripture also materially evidences, affirms, provides for the use of reason) "good and necessary consequence" then the development of a canon is found to be Scriptural.
meaning that whatever a thus it affirms that "It belongeth to synods and councils, ministerially to determine controversies of faith, and cases of conscience; to set down rules and directions for the better ordering of the public worship of God, and government of his church; to receive complaints in cases of maladministration, and authoritatively to determine the same..." - The Westminster Confession of Faith (1647)
Thus the issue is that of sola prima,
2. “Word of God”
“Word” in Holy Scripture quite often refers to a proclaimed, oral word of prophets or apostles. They spoke the word of God, whether or not their utterances were later recorded in Scripture (see, e.g., Jer 25:3, 7-8). The oral “word” had equal authority. This was also true of apostolic preaching (1 Thess 2:13).
As said, this argument and its polemical premise is invalid, since while men such as the apostles could speak as wholly inspired of God and provide new public revelation thereby, and thus call souls to hold fast to their tradition, Rome does not and cannot presumes its popes and ecumenical councils speak as wholly inspired of God.
3. Tradition is Not a Dirty Word
The Bible condemns corrupt traditions of men (e.g., Matt 15:2-6, Mk 7:8-13, Col 2:8). Catholics agree with this. But it’s not the whole truth. True, apostolic traditions are also positively endorsed. These traditions are in total harmony with and consistent with Scripture. In that sense, Scripture is the “final judge” of tradition, but not in the sense that it rules out all binding tradition and Church authority (see, e.g., Acts 2:42; 1 Cor 11:2; 2 Thess 2:15; 2 Tim 1:13-14; 2:2; Jude 3).
As said, what authentic apostolic traditions consist of rests upon the premise of the tradition of ensured magisterial veracity, thus being circular logic. For Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares, and presumes protection from at least salvific error in non-infallible magisterial teaching on faith and morals.
4. Jesus and Paul Accepted Non-Biblical Oral and Written Traditions
Jesus and St. Paul accepted the authority of the Old Testament, but they also appealed to other authority, outside of written revelation. For example, in Matthew 23:2-3, Jesus teaches that the scribes and Pharisees have a legitimate, binding authority, based on a teaching succession from Moses’ seat, which phrase (or idea) cannot be found anywhere in the Old Testament. It is found in the (originally oral) Mishna.
Wrong. First, if the RCs cared to search, though should fined that the idea - as a principle - of supreme - but not of ensured perpetual infallibility - magisterial authority can be found in the Old Testament, as can that of civil authority and the supreme court, (Dt. 17:8-13) as well as successors in Judaism Ezra 7:25; Nehemiah 8:4-8; Malachi 2:7)
Secondly, the fact that something found in a source called "tradition" is cited in Scripture does not mean that whatever is in that tradition is of God, any more than Paul citing a truth expressed by a pagan (Acts 17:28) means that whatever else is in that tradition is of God. And SS affirms the principle of more Scripture being added to the OT and discerned as it.
The issue thus becomes the authority of the entity that states that something is of God, and in the cited examples it is wholly God-inspired sources, Christ and Paul, who affirm such, while as for Rome, she does not speaks as wholly God-inspired voice, and her claim of EPMV is one that rests upon itself.
[4b] In 1 Corinthians 10:4, St. Paul refers to a rock which “followed” the Jews through the Sinai wilderness. The Old Testament says nothing about such miraculous movement, i
More ignorance: "And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:4) is indeed spoken of, the literal event of water out of a rock (Exo. 17:6; Num. 20:11; Psa. 78:15, Psa. 78:20, Psa. 105:41) which represented spiritual drink and the spiritual Rock which was Christ. And who followed them. (Exodus 13:21,32) Whatever tradition says does not negate the Biblical basis for this statement.
Paul refers in 2 Timothy 3:8: to “Jannes and Jambres” who “opposed Moses”. These two men cannot be found in the related Old Testament passage (Exodus 7:8 ff.), or anywhere else in the Old Testament.
Again, the fact that something found in a source called "tradition" is cited in Scripture does not mean that whatever is in that tradition is of God, any more than Paul citing a truth expressed by a pagan (Acts 17:28) means that whatever else is in that tradition is of God. The issue thus becomes the authority of the entity that states that something is of God, and in the cited examples it is wholly God-inspired sources, Christ and Paul, who affirm such, while as for Rome, she does not speaks as wholly God-inspired voice, and her claim of EPMV is one that rests upon itself.
5. Jerusalem Council
The Jerusalem Council (Acts 15:6-30) made an authoritative pronouncement (citing the Holy Spirit) which was binding on all Christians (Acts 15:28-29).
Indeed, and again SS affirms "It belongeth to synods and councils, ministerinially to determine controversies of faith, and cases of conscience; to set down rules and directions" if Scriptural, and James provided Scriptural substantiation in the concluding judgment on this matter of discipline.
But while we know that this was of God since it is recorded in Scripture, neither this or any other event examples or teaches ensured perpetual magisterial veracity as per Rome, and Peter did not decree anything here. 6. Pharisees, and Oral, Extrabiblical Tradition
Christianity was derived in many ways from the pharisaical tradition of Judaism (which accepted oral tradition). Christian Pharisees are referred to (Acts 15:5; Phil 3:5), so neither the (orthodox) Old Testament Jews nor the early Church were guided by the principle of sola Scriptura.
Non-sensical leaps of illogic. Scripture provided the epistemological doctrinal and prophetic foundation for the NT church, which church actually began in dissent from those who sat in the seat of Moses over Israel, to whom conditional obedience was enjoined, (Mt. 23:2; cf. Dt. 17:8-13) which judgments included which men and writings were of God and which were not, (Mk. 11:27-33) as the historical magisterial head over Israel which was the historical instrument and steward of Scripture, "because that unto them were committed the oracles of God," (Rm. 3:2) to whom pertaineth" the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises" (Rm. 9:4) of Divine guidance, presence and perpetuation as they believed, (Gn. 12:2,3; 17:4,7,8; Ex. 19:5; Lv. 10:11; Dt. 4:31; 17:8-13; Ps, 11:4,9; Is. 41:10, Ps. 89:33,34; Jer. 7:23)
And instead they followed an itinerant Preacher whom the magisterium rejected, and which the Messiah reproved, based upon Scripture as being supreme, (Mk. 7:2-16) and established His Truth claims upon scriptural substantiation in word and in power, as did the early church as it began upon this basis. (Mt. 22:23-45; Lk. 24:27,44; Jn. 5:36,39; Acts 2:14-35; 4:33; 5:12; 15:6-21;17:2,11; 18:28; 28:23; Rm. 15:19; 2Cor. 12:12, etc.)
The fact that the church flowed from the OT and thus elements of Pharisaical authority simply does not affirm or equate to adoption of all their modus operandi and premise of veracity, and instead of affirmation of all their tradition they are are reproved for being contrary to Scripture. (Mk. 7:1-13)
7. Old Testament Jews Did Not Believe in Sola Scriptura / Necessity of Interpretation
Ezra read the law of Moses to the people in Jerusalem (Neh 8:3). Thirteen Levites assisted him and “helped the people to understand the law” (8:7)
SS strawman. Sad that an professional RC apologist engages in this, as if Westminster all the SS commentaries and teachers were the ones who did not understand SS.
[7b] St. Peter states that “no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation” (2 Pet 1:20), and [he] refers to parts of Paul's epistles being “hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction,
Which in context, refers to how written prophecy was given, (cf. 1 Peter 1:10) and not to understanding it. Thus in his driven defense of his church-god, Armstrong actually examples false ignorant understanding of Scripture while telling us we need Catholicism to understand it.
8. 2 Timothy 3:16-17: The Protestant “Proof Text” This passage doesn’t teach formal sufficiency.
It does not need to. SS includes material sufficiency as defined above, and Godliness is also said to be "profitable," (1 Timothy 4:7- same word) and any source that is able to provide the man of God so that he "may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works" is teaching a sufficiency Rome arrogates to herself.
Paul makes reference to oral tradition three times (1:13-14, 2:2, 3:14).
Paul is referring to himself and wholly God-inspired teaching, not the elitist presumptions of a church whose distinctive Catholic teachings are not manifest in the only wholly God-inspired, substantive, authoritative record of what the NT church believed (which is Scripture, in particular Acts through Revelation, which best shows how the NT church understood the gospels).
Also, a very similar passage, Ephesians 4:11-15, would prove (using Protestant reasoning) the sufficiency of “pastors” and “teachers” for the attainment of Christian perfection.
Yes, but as instruments using the instrument which provides the man of God so that he "may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works" - not the arrogant claims of Rome, which can even claim an event occurred which history failed to record when it would have been.
9. Paul Casually Assumes that His Passed-Down Tradition is Infallible and Binding
Same failed argument of arrogant presumption as above.
10. Sola Scriptura is a Radically Circular Position
When Protestants are asked why one should believe in their particular denominational teaching rather than another, each will appeal to the “Bible’s clear teaching”. This is similar to people on two sides of a legal, constitutional debate both saying, “well, we go by what is constitutional, whereas you guys don’t.” But judges and courts are necessary, and their decrees are binding. Protestantism lacks this element because it appeals to a logically self-defeating principle and a book (which must always be interpreted by human beings).
Actually, the Radically Circular Position is that of Rome. Bible Christians are the ones who most strongly work to establish the authority of the Bible, and not just invoke it, while the RCC teaches that one must have faith in her to know what the contents of Scripture are. (...no matter what be done the believer cannot believe in the Bible nor find in it the object of his faith until he has previously made an act of faith in the intermediary authorities..." - Catholic Encyclopedia>Tradition and Living Magisterium; http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15006b.htm; ...when we appeal to the Scriptures for proof of the Church's infallible authority we appeal to them merely as reliable historical sources... - Catholic Encyclopedia>Infallibility; http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07790a.htm
The issue is the basis for veracity. While the veracity of the claims of a Bible Christian must rest upon the weighty of Scriptural substantiation in word and in power, while for a faithful RC, assurance is based upon the novel and unScriptural premise of ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility as per Rome, who has infallibly declared she is conditionally perpetually incapable of error, at least in salvific matters. Thus Scripture, tradition and history can only assuredly consist of and mean what Rome may say they do.
Thus no less than Cardinal Manning stated, • "It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine....The only Divine evidence to us of what was primitive is the witness and voice of the Church at this hour." — Most Rev. Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, Lord Archbishop of Westminster, The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation (New York: J.P. Kenedy & Sons, originally written 1865, pp. 227,28
That Armstrong's Radically Circular Position assertion supremely applies to Rome.
Thus Rome can even declare something to be a matter of binding belief that was so lacking in testimony from early tradition that her own scholars disallowed it as being part of apostolic tradition.
• As Ratzinger states,
Before Mary's bodily Assumption into heaven was defined, all theological faculties in the world were consulted for their opinion. Our teachers' answer was emphatically negative . What here became evident was the one-sidedness, not only of the historical, but of the historicist method in theology. “Tradition” was identified with what could be proved on the basis of texts. Altaner , the patrologist from Wurzburg…had proven in a scientifically persuasive manner that the doctrine of Mary’s bodily Assumption into heaven was unknown before the 5C ; this doctrine, therefore, he argued, could not belong to the “apostolic tradition. And this was his conclusion, which my teachers at Munich shared .
This argument is compelling if you understand “tradition” strictly as the handing down of fixed formulas and texts [meaning having actual substance in history]…But if you conceive of “tradition” as the living process whereby the Holy Spirit introduces us to the fullness of truth and teaches us how to understand what previously we could still not grasp (cf. Jn 16:12-13), then subsequent “remembering” (cf. Jn 16:4, for instance) can come to recognize what it has not caught sight of [even bcz there was nothing to see] previously and was already handed down [invisibly, without evidence] in the original Word,” — J. Ratzinger, Milestones (Ignatius, n.d.), 58-59 (words in [brackets] are mine).
'Since you reject the only living duly elected pope and disent from V2 the novus ordo church (The Catholic Church has already shut itself up since VCII. The Church no longer proclaims, Christ, the Sovereign King, to all nations; nor does it preach, "extra Ecclesiam nulla salus"' - 31; "You may want to give VCII a pass; but I will never do so." 20 , then in essence you are acting like traditional evangelical Bible Christians are to do as regards determining what is true teaching.
Meaning that the latter are to examine what is taught by examination of its comport with valid church teaching, which TradCaths also do, and with divisions among both, with the division btwn traditional evangelical Bible Christians and TradCaths being that the latter look to what they selectively choose as being past teaching, while the former are to look to the only wholly inspired substantive authoritative record of what the NT church believed (which is Scripture, in particular Acts through Revelation, which best shows how the NT church understood the gospels) in which .distinctive Catholic teachings are not manifest.
If submission and unity itself is the goal, then submission such as required by many past popes is what TradCaths do not example:
'the one duty of the multitude is to allow themselves to be led, and, like a docile flock, to follow the Pastors," "to suffer themselves to be guided and led in all things that touch upon faith or morals by the Holy Church of God through its Supreme Pastor the Roman Pontiff," "of submitting with docility to their judgment," with "no discussions regarding what he orders or demands, or up to what point obedience must go, and in what things he is to be obeyed... not only in person, but with letters and other public documents ;" and 'not limit the field in which he might and must exercise his authority, " for "obedience must not limit itself to matters which touch the faith: its sphere is much more vast: it extends to all matters which the episcopal power embraces," and not set up "some kind of opposition between one Pontiff and another. Those who, faced with two differing directives, reject the present one to hold to the past, are not giving proof of obedience to the authority which has the right and duty to guide them," "Nor must it be thought that what is expounded in Encyclical Letters does not of itself demand consent." (Sources http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3578348/posts?page=14#14)
It turns out that I dealt with this 2016 polemic in 2020 after he pulled my response to him on his web site :
Step-by-Step Refutation of Dave Armstrong vs. Sola Scriptura, by the grace of God. https://peacebyjesuscom.blogspot.com/2020/01/step-by-step-refutation-of-dave.html
Peter called satan...
Yuppers-That’s a tough one for anybody.
.
Also when Jesus was under arrest being Charged, mocked and Beaten-—
When Jesus needed his FRiend the Most
Peter denied Jesus THREE TIMES !
.
Caths should be proud of That because They
Still Mock Him.
You did not disappoint.
Do you, too, reject Thessalonians 2:14? Are you the typical protestant Bible cherry-picker?
That and all appeal to tradition was refuted (READ!), but since you do not read what refutes you and care not why others disagree (and did not even get the verse correct) then why take more time? What is manifest is that your apologist is a typical Bible cherry-picker
Well; here are 67 biblical passages that refer to OT SCRIPTURE and 4 from the NT emphasizing the Scriptural words found there.
Feel free to post the verses that place a lot of importance on tradition.
OF course.
That's why apparitions have to visit them from time to time to get them back on track (or on a new one.)
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