Canon of Scripture, Catholic Style

  • Thread starter Thread starter Fredricks
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Thank you. Now we can have a discussion. (I apologize for my mental dullness). I know it is bad form but I am going to answer a question with a question in defiance of everything every language arts teacher has ever taught me.

Is there any resource to suggest that the Catholic Church knew of, and openly approved of the inclusion of books not declared inspired at Hippo, Carthage, and Trent ? I don’t consider this to be trivial at all, given the fact that all of these incidents you cite are Orthodox and not Catholic. Even today, you can see Catholic Bishops that openly defy and contradict Church teaching…the fact that Bishops defy Church Doctrine does not make the Doctrine incorrect. And although I am no expert on the Scism of 1054, I am fairly certain that the events leading to that split were a long time in the making, and I wouldnt be at all surprised if this issue had something to do with that. I guess my next question would be “Are (or were) any of these Councils that you provide accepted as valid by the Catholic Church ?”
 
The problem of having a definitive set Canon should be more troubling for a Sola Scriptura Protestant. How do you know which Canon is the right one?

This article is about the deuterocanonicals but it is useful for the historical information related to Fredericks’ question:

catholic.com/thisrock/2005/0503sbs.asp
 
40.png
Fredricks:
Petra are you not aware that different parts of what you guys claim to be a united church were using different books prior to the split???
Click to expand...
Give me dates and give me groups. You are confusing Catholicism with Orthodox and other schismatic groups.
 
40.png
Eden:
The problem of having a definitive set Canon should be more troubling for a Sola Scriptura Protestant. How do you know which Canon is the right one?
Click to expand...
Amen!! 👍
 
“Are (or were) any of these Councils that you provide accepted as valid by the Catholic Church ?”
Click to expand...
This is really what I am saying. The Catholic church was not one. Prior to 1054 and long before that. If the Catholic church was united, you could not ask that question. The early Christian church was a group of ethnic and geographical groups in many cases acting quite independent of Rome. The supposedly united Catholic church did not have a canon agreed upon. Why would this be the case?
 
40.png
petra:
Give me dates and give me groups. You are confusing Catholicism with Orthodox and other schismatic groups.
Click to expand...
Petra, according to you guys EVERYONE was Catholic prior to 1054. See the problem?
 
No you misconstrue or simply misinterpret history. The gnostics, the arians, and the anabaptists were all clearly NOT Catholic, and although 1054 was marked as the official split of the Orthodox Church, the conditions that led to that split did not happen instantaneously one day in 1054. It is true that all churches were specific to ethnic and geographic locales, but they WERE in communion with Rome. That is what made them Catholic (universal). The Churches that broke with Rome and eventually became the Orthodox Churches were in a state of tension for quite some time prior to 1054, and to this day the only real objection of the Orthodox Church is Papal Authority. If anything, the fact that Orthodox Doctrine is almost perfectly parallel to Catholic Doctrine just goes to strengthen the case that they were at one point in history united.
 
Now as far as acting independently of Rome, that is PRECISELY where the Schism of 1054 stems from. It is my understanding that the Church in Rome had the teaching authority over the east (as should be apparent by theology and doctrine), but because of geography, it was hard to maintain the administrative authority over the east that it had originally had.
 
40.png
Fredricks:
Petra, according to you guys EVERYONE was Catholic prior to 1054. See the problem?
Click to expand...
You are mistaken. I’m not sure where you get the idea everyone was Catholic up to that time, but you’re wrong about that. There have been schismatics throughout Christian history.

Are we still talking about the Canon of Scripture, Catholic Style? If not, I must have missed where the discussion took a turn.
 
I think his ultimate point is that since various schismatic groups prior to 1054 had Canons of Scripture that were not in line with the declaration of Rome, then the Apostolic Tradition claimed by Catholics must be false, and there had never been an established authority to govern the Church, therefore (drumroll please (i know the conclusion is going to shock you)…the CAtholic Church must not REALLY be the Church established by Christ.
 
40.png
joshua_b:
No you misconstrue or simply misinterpret history. The gnostics, the arians, and the anabaptists were all clearly NOT Catholic, and although 1054 was marked as the official split of the Orthodox Church, the conditions that led to that split did not happen instantaneously one day in 1054. It is true that all churches were specific to ethnic and geographic locales, but they WERE in communion with Rome. That is what made them Catholic (universal). The Churches that broke with Rome and eventually became the Orthodox Churches were in a state of tension for quite some time prior to 1054, and to this day the only real objection of the Orthodox Church is Papal Authority. If anything, the fact that Orthodox Doctrine is almost perfectly parallel to Catholic Doctrine just goes to strengthen the case that they were at one point in history united.
Click to expand...
ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/reading/ortho_cath.html
to discuss all the differences.

They had different canons across the “universal” world, I would say that is important.
 
40.png
joshua_b:
Now as far as acting independently of Rome, that is PRECISELY where the Schism of 1054 stems from. It is my understanding that the Church in Rome had the teaching authority over the east (as should be apparent by theology and doctrine), but because of geography, it was hard to maintain the administrative authority over the east that it had originally had.
Click to expand...
Very good and when you find out that was not the case… Actually I am not interested in you guys, just my wavering brethren.
 
40.png
petra:
You are mistaken. I’m not sure where you get the idea everyone was Catholic up to that time, but you’re wrong about that. There have been schismatics throughout Christian history.

Are we still talking about the Canon of Scripture, Catholic Style? If not, I must have missed where the discussion took a turn.
Click to expand...
We are talking about it. I have not changed the subject. Read the first posts.

How many “schismatics” does it take to convince a Catholic that the early Church was not as unified as thought?
We shall find out.
 
So you concede that Rome had teaching authority over the east ? If so, I think it is important to point out to your wavering bretheren that the Orthodox Church is the only other Church to have all 7 sacraments (and yes they are called sacraments, and they are all valid), and the only other Church to claim (validly I might add) unbroken Apostolic Succession. What I don’t see you pointing out to your “waivering bretheren” is that NO church prior to the reformation of the 1500’s denied the validity or neccessity of the sacraments, denied the priesthood or Apostolic Succession, or denied the neccessity of Sacred Tradition in defining Doctrine. If you show me one historically documented church that fits this criteria, then maybe you will have begun to prove your case.
 
In the early days of the Church, the churches couldn’t all have had the same canon if they had wanted to. They simply didn’t all have copies of all the books. They couldn’t just go to their local Christian book store.
 
If you can’t provide proof of this (and I really don’t think its going to happen…I tried for a long time, that’s why I’m Catholic today) then all you have done is prove that the Orthodox Church split from the Catholic Church. To say they were never unified, given the fact that there Doctrines are parallel to one another, and Doctrine is never allowed to change, is just a blatant defiance of common sense.
 
The Iambic Pen:
In the early days of the Church, the churches couldn’t all have had the same canon if they had wanted to. They simply didn’t all have copies of all the books. They couldn’t just go to their local Christian book store.
Click to expand...
That too…(sorry to walk on you Iambic Pen).
 
I’m still waiting for Fredericks to discuss the Protestant Council that set his church’s canon in the 3rd century and was later definitively set by the Council of Luther in the 16th century.

That didn’t happen? Hmmm… I wonder what this all means for Fredericks bible and that of his wavering brethren? :hmmm:

Sola Scriptura but which Scriptura?
 
40.png
Fredricks:
We are talking about it. I have not changed the subject. Read the first posts.

How many “schismatics” does it take to convince a Catholic that the early Church was not as unified as thought?
We shall find out.
Click to expand...
By definition, a schismatic is outside of the Church, and as such, there is no disunity within the Church. Some schismatics held extremely heretical views against which the Church took a stand. Do you see a problem with that? It is the infallability of Sacred Tradition that has made error intolerable. If you want to push the point that there were in fact schismatics and heretics, you are making a case that Sacred Tradition was alive and well because the unity and orthodoxy of the Church was preserved. The alternative would have been to become a pluralist religion. While that may be more palatable to you, it is not how history played out, thank God.

On matters that had not been defined “deFide” Christians were free to have varied theological views. That is still true. Catholics are free to interpret predestination according to Thomist or Molinist views. Catholics are free to believe in an old earth or a 6000 year old earth. But on matters that the Church as defined as dogmas, we are unified. That was true 1800 years ago. Before the canon was fixed, the earliest Christians were free to have an opinion about which writings were inspired. But once the Church made a determination, the case was settled. Anyone who became an opponent to that decision was no longer within the Church. And Church unity and Sacred Tradition were not compromised.
 
40.png
Fredricks:
HOW can you say they were non-Catholic when you deny a split prior to 1054!!!
Click to expand...
You clearly don’t understand history. There were undeniably many heresies and schisms throughout history. These were all minor and most of those groups died out.

Then in 1054 the split happened between east and west. That was a major split. There is really no comparison between splinter groups that happened throughout history and the major schism between east and west.

It doesn’t prove your point, only that you can’t judge history.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top