It seems to me Sola Scriptura is in tension with the creeds.
How so? If this were true, it would be news to the millions of Protestants who recite the creeds in church or learned them in a Christian school (like I learned the Apostles Creed).
I think the Restoration Movement had the better idea, if Sola Scriptura were true.
Sure, “no creed but the Bible” is a great idea. Pentecostals tried that too, and we got the Oneness doctrine out of it and had to basically fight the modalist heresy all over again. Which of course, led the Assemblies of God to adopt the Statement of Fundamental Truths, which is itself a creed.
My point is that it’s a great ideal but only an ideal. The Restoration Movement in fact does have its own creeds outside of the Bible. Much of what they insist on comes not from the Bible but from their own tradition.
Mormonism et. al. are in many ways just revisiting Christological heresies that were settled by councils. The councils are potentially outside of what defines a Protestant. And if not introduce a problem of explaining why councils ceased to matter.
Protestants never claimed councils “ceased to matter.” What we claim, in the words of the 39 Articles of Religion, is that “they may err, and sometimes have erred, even in things pertaining unto God. Wherefore things ordained by them as necessary to salvation have neither strength nor authority, unless it may be declared that they be taken out of holy Scripture.”
The Mormon claim, if I understand it, is that the Church went off the rails very early on. They also claim extra revelation given to their founders and leaders. It seems to me they could be considered Protestant in as much as their approach to the faith shares much with Protestantism especially in the idea that the Church was corrupted. Outside of their rejection of the Trinity what makes them not Protestant?
Protestants teach that the church had accrued some unbiblical doctrines. This is true. However, Protestants believe there has always been a church on earth since the Day of Pentecost. As the Westminster Confession of Faith states:
III. Unto this catholic visible Church Christ has given the ministry, oracles, and ordinances of God, for the gathering and perfecting of the saints, in this life, to the end of the world: and does, by His own presence and Spirit, according to His promise, make them effectual thereunto.[7]
IV. This catholic Church has been sometimes more, sometimes less visible.[8] And particular Churches, which are members thereof, are more or less pure, according as the doctrine of the Gospel is taught and embraced, ordinances administered, and public worship performed more or less purely in them.[9]
V. The purest Churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error;[10] and some have so degenerated, as to become no Churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan.[11] Nevertheless, there shall be always a Church on earth to worship God according to His will.[12]
This is completely different from what Mormons believe. They believe that before Joseph Smith came on the scene the Church of Jesus Christ had faded away completely in a Great Apostasy. It was only Joseph Smith who God trusted to restore the church on earth, ensuring that today the Mormon Church is, according to adherents, the only true church on earth with fullness of doctrine, priesthood authority, and the testimony of Jesus Christ.
If we take the 3 Protestant distinctives–sola scriptura, sola fide,and sola gratia–the Mormon Church fails all of them. How can you think they are Protestant? They are nothing like Protestants.
The special revelation? Seventh Day Adventists have special revelation, but do, so far as I know, hold an orthodox Trinitarian view. Are Adventists Protestant?
Adventists believe in the continuation of spiritual gifts, such as prophecy. Pentecostals do to, and, so far as I understand, so does the Catholic Church. At the same time, the Seventh-Day Adventist Church affirms in its 28 Fundamentals Sola Scriptura:
The Holy Scriptures, Old and New Testaments, are the written Word of God, given by divine inspiration. The inspired authors spoke and wrote as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. In this Word, God has committed to humanity the knowledge necessary for salvation. The Holy Scriptures are the supreme, authoritative, and the infallible revelation of His will. They are the standard of character, the test of experience, the definitive revealer of doctrines, and the trustworthy record of God’s acts in history. (Ps. 119:105; Prov. 30:5, 6; Isa. 8:20; John 17:17; 1 Thess. 2:13; 2 Tim. 3:16, 17; Heb. 4:12; 2 Peter 1:20, 21.)
I don’t claim to be an expert but it seems to me the Mormons could be said to be like other Protestant Churches in rejecting some elements of tradition. Trying to determine what is essential Christian belief is a fundamental problem for Protestantism. I just don’t see how that it solved. I think we could come up with a definition of Protestant that many people would agree on. Imposing that definition we could certainly make it so that Mormons are not Protestant. But really defining Protestantism beyond the initial churches that split directly from the Catholic Church seems problematic.
“Trying to determine what is essential Christian belief” is not a problem for Protestantism. Protestants agree that “essential Christian belief” is found in Holy Scripture. (Mormons don’t believe this, so they aren’t and cannot be Protestants.) The problem is that different Protestant denominations read Holy Scripture in different ways and therefore come to different conclusions about what is essential belief.
shaw: Obvious doesn’t know what he’s talking about. :dts:
