Catholics are Taught to "Denegrate the Authority of the Bible"

[JRKH]

In Post # 357 of the Thread Protestant Questions About Purgatory Protestant101 brought up this point re: Catholics being taught to denigrate the authority of the Bible. I invite all to comment and to make clear the Catholic position re: the bible and the quotes on his posted link.

But I do have reasons for thinking that Catholics are taught by their leadership to lessen the authority of the Bible; to denigrate it to the point where it does not have the authority that God intended it to have in the Church; and God did intend that the Bible have FULL unhindered authority in His Church; and in His people. There are so many places where "the [Catholic] Church can be shown to minimize the Bible’s authority: Papal Rome Against The Bible

Protestant101 if this is your sole source for information I am not surprise that you have such a negative view of Catholics. If you would like to know the official Catholic Teachings on the Authority of the Bible, I strongly recommend looking at the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The section that will help you is Part one Sections 2 and 3. This is a good searchable site so you can look up things very easily.

Peace
James

 

[Prodigal_Son1]

Protesants are taught to denigrate the authority of Christ’s Church including the early Church fathers who chose which letters and books would be used in the complete Bible. How can anyone give authority to the Bible if they reject the authority of those who put the Bible together for us?

I’ve had a protestant, on this forum, reject writings of Justin Martyr and Irenaeus because they were not in scriptures and he rejected “man’s” interpretations of the Bible. He was asked more than once, wasn’t he a man himself?

I’d also like to make another point about private interpretations. With thousands of different churchs throughout the world today, all built on someone’s intrepretation of the Bible, which one church is right? They all have slightly different interpretations of the Bible. The results are confusing or chaos, if you will. God is not a God of confusion or chaos.

When this country was established and the constitution of the United States was written, did the founding fathers make sure everyone got a copy so they could interpret it? No, they established a government with courts to determine the meanings of those documents. That system came from humans.

God is far more superior and offered a plan to maintain His Church and His Word, both protected by the Holy Spirit. As we must have faith in God, we must have faith in His abilities to secure His message to all of us to have the same message. To deny that is not being open to receive God’s love for us and very close to rejecting Him based on their own private interpretations.

May the peace of the Lord be with you,
Prodigal Son1

 

[redrosetea]

Well considering it was a Catholic, St Jerome that gave us the Bible in the first place, I think this is just a joke, by an ill informed person

 

[JRKH]

In any quote stating that the "Catholic Church Burned Bibles’ the immediate emotional reaction is one of dispair and revulsion.
After all, isn’t there only One Holy Bible? Isn’t there Only One Word of God? How could the Church do such a thing?

But within the very idea that there is only one Bible lies the problem with taking these stateemnts at face value.
Example 1 - The Catholic Church recognizes a different canon of books in the Bible than the Protestants do. If the Bible is God’s word why are there two canon’s?
Example 2 - Translations may or may not be accurate. For instance the JW Bible is mistranslated in the Beginning of John to say that "The Word was A god’, instead of the Word was God. Should this Watchtower published Bible be given the same authority as the KJV or the Douey-Rheims?

Thus it can be seen upon quick examination that just saying Bible, does not clarify which of several possible Bibles one is talking about.

The Church, in excersizing the authority given by Christ had to protect the Word from poor and unauthorized translation and mis-interpretation. This was accomplished by several methods. One was the retention of the Bible in Latin, or in the Original Greek and Hebrew. This limits the number of different translations floating around. Second was the idea of controlling, or licencing the production/translation of the Bible. This provided the safeguard of assuring the texts were translated correctly from the origional texts, or from the Latin. Bibles not translated under this authority were not considered to be Sacred Scripture and thus not protected.

Lastly, it is necessary to recognize that in many cases, councils were dealing with some or other heresy. Protecting the Faithful from heretical teachings from poorly translated Bibles was a primary motivator.

Peace
James

 

[Prodigal_Son1]

JRKH,

I’d like to also add more explanation of some facts.

The printing press was not invented until the 14 century and the first was not fast enough to mass produce publications.

Also consider the literacy rate of the populations through the centuries. A very small amount of people could actually read. Approximately 20% of the world’s population still can’t read today. This number was much higher, say in the 16th century and worse as we wind back the clock even further.

God Bless,
Prodigal Son1

 

[JRKH]

Doing a bit of Research I ran across This Thread Here

It contains some good info on why the Action was taken.

 

[JRKH]

The Council of Toulouse:
A regional council called in defense of the Church against heresy. The Prohibition on bibles in the vernacular relates directly to mistranslated Bibles and misinterpretation of Scripture.

The Roman Catholic Council of Tarragona
A regional Council called to formally define the inquisition at that time in Spain. Again this is a regional council called to deal with heresies within the Church.

The Council of Trent (1545-1564)
The greatest and longest of all the major ecumenical councils, Trent was the ideal Counter-Reformation to the Protestant Reformation where Protestantism was condemned as anathema along with Martin Luther and other reformers who had bolted the Church. Therefore we see again a situation where unauthorized translations of the Bible were being made, circulated, and privately interpreted in defiance of the authority of God’s Church.

The quote in question from Trent reads:

“Since it is clear from experience that if the Sacred Books are permitted everywhere and without discrimination in the vernacular (in the common language of the people, D.R.) there will by reasons of the boldness of men arise there from more harm than good…” Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, p. 274.

Note in this the words:
“From experience” – The Church has had to deal with heresy before
“Without discrimination” – In other words without any controls or regard for proper interpretation.
“More Harm than Good” – Sola Scripture and personal interpretation has provided little in the way of unity and only fostered more and more splits within Protestantism

As to the various quotes in the Article from:

J.A. Wylie, an authority on Romanism in the Reformation era, dedicated two chapters of his book The Papacy; Its History, Dogmas, Genius, and Prospects (London: Hamilton Adams, 1888) to Rome’s attitude toward the Bible. Wylie states: “The Latin Vulgate is the authorized standard in the Church of Rome, and that to the disparagement of the original Hebrew and Greek Scriptures. These are omitted in the decree [by the Council of Trent], and a translation is substituted. All Protestant translations, such as our authorized English version, Luther’s translation, &c. are prohibited” The Papacy; Its History, Dogmas, Genius, and Prospects, p. 181.

Why shouldn’t God’s Holy Church denounce Bibles that removed Books, and added words to foster a particular heretical view.

Pope Pius VII (1800-1823) denounced Bible Societies and expressed shock at the circulation of the Scriptures. This Pope declared, “It is evidence from experience, that the holy Scriptures, when circulated in the vulgar tongue, have, through the temerity of men, produced more harm than benefit.”

Pope Gregory XVI (1831-1846) railed: “against the publication, distribution, reading, and possession of books of the holy Scriptures translated into the vulgar tongue.”

Pope Leo XIII declared, “As it has been clearly shown by experience that, if the holy Bible in the vernacular is generally permitted without any distinction, more harm than utility is thereby caused…” Great Encyclical Letters of Leo XIII, pp. 412-413.

Where in any of these statements is the Word of God Denigrated. These statements speak directly to the problem of translation and interpretation.

As to the Other Statements:

Pope Leo XII called the Protestant Bible the “Gospel of the Devil” in an encyclical letter of 1824. In January 1850, he also condemned Bible Societies and admitted the fact that the distribution of Scripture has “long been condemned by the holy chair.”

Why is the underlined portion, which is so important to the point of the author NOT within quotation marks?
The Actual Quote: “long been condemned by the holy chair.” could be for anything.

On December 8, 1866, after European Bible societies had been formed to translate and spread the Word of God, Pope Pius IX, in his encyclical Quanta Cura, issued this amazing statement: “Socialism, Communism, clandestine societies, Bible societies… pests of this sort must be destroyed by all means.”

Here again, I have to wonder what is between the words “Societies” and Pests” unless this information is provided we have no idea what the Holy Father is trying to convey.

In short, each and every instance of the Church supposedly suppressing the Bible, was in actuality an effort to preserve it. To assure that the Word was protected from mistranslation and misinterpretation.

(continued below)

 

[JRKH]

(Cont.)

Finally this is what the Catholic church Catechism has to say:
(bolded by me)

103 For this reason, the Church has always venerated the Scriptures as she venerates the Lord’s Body. She never ceases to present to the faithful the bread of life, taken from the one table of God’s Word and Christ’s Body.

104 In Sacred Scripture, the Church constantly finds her nourishment and her strength, for she welcomes it not as a human word, “but as what it really is, the word of God”. “In the sacred books, the Father who is in heaven comes lovingly to meet his children, and talks with them.”

II. INSPIRATION AND TRUTH OF SACRED SCRIPTURE

105 God is the author of Sacred Scripture. “The divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of Sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.”
**“For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.” **

This is what the Church Teaches.

Peace
James

 

[rpp]

Catholic hold the Scriptures in highest esteem.

For example, the Latin Rite Mass in Ordinary Form will read nearly all of the New Testament, every Psalm, and a major fraction of the Old Testament over a period of three years.

If a person attends daily Mass, they will hear nearly the entire Bible in two years.

Catholics most certainly hold the Bible in the highest esteem.

We also hold in high esteem the traditions that the Apostles passed on too, which most Protestant do not.

 

[NotWorthy]

All you have to do is watch the procession into the Mass. We have the Crucifix (most often) followed by the Lector with the Book of the Gospels (The readings from the Gospels). It is held high over our heads in reverence, then placed on the center of the altar.

One just has to watch our priest pick up the book (I don’t know the official name of it) and bring it to the Lectern in order to see the reverence that is held for the Bible.

 

[RobHom]

I am “always” amused at the fact that protestants always revert to using “propaganda” foisted on the gullible… who make the foolish decision to believe it…

The Catholic Church has NEVER taught or even tried to teach anyone that the Bible was less important than it is. The Catholic Church is built on “Scripture”…

Considering that back in the days of the so-called prohibitions… the majority, the vast majority of the people were illiterate…and Bibles were hand copied…not to mention expensive…one can only shudder at what would have happened to a Bible if they got a hold of it.

Further…in so far as prohibitions against translating the Bible into different languages… Look at what has happened over the years. Even the “protestants” can’t agree on “which Bible is the bestest one”!!

Actually, I tend to think that the longer and the harder they rail and scream about the Bible…and what not…the more they themselves denigrate its authority…because most of the protestants today think that they are going to Burger King to get their religion…they want to have it their way…and they think that they can pick and choose the ingredients to make their “whopper” up with.

The Catholic Church over the years has been proven to be the one Christian Church that has been steadfast in its teachings with regards to the Bible…and has always been resistant to change for any reason. Appeasement of the “masses” (as in people) has not been of great concern to the Holy See.

 

[Protestant101]

The Church, in excersizing the authority given by Christ had to protect the Word from poor and unauthorized translation and mis-interpretation. This was accomplished by several methods.

Second was the idea of controlling, or licencing the production/translation of the Bible. This provided the safeguard of assuring the texts were translated correctly from the origional texts, or from the Latin.

Bibles not translated under this authority were not considered to be Sacred Scripture and thus not protected.

Peace James

Can you point me to official Catholic writings which would tell us more about this “licensing” of the Bible? When was this done, by who, and how?

 

[Protestant101]

Considering that back in the days of the so-called prohibitions… the majority, the vast majority of the people were illiterate…and Bibles were hand copied…not to mention expensive…one can only shudder at what would have happened to a Bible if they got a hold of it.

What do you mean? What are you saying would happen to such ones if they had gotten hold of a Bible back then? What happens TODAY when an “illiterate” person reads the Bible? Your stements here are ridiculous.

 

[JRKH]

Can you point me to official Catholic writings which would tell us more about this “licensing” of the Bible? When was this done, by who, and how?

Off hand I cannot. I got the “Licencing” thing from the article you linked to called “Papal Rome Against the Bible”.

I assume at this point that “Licencing” would involve getting the Bible from a bonafied source i.e. From or through an Abbey etc. I’m not sure what information migth be out there since in most cases the councils and quotes involved were of local nature.

I’ll do a little checking when I get the chance.

Maybe someone else here can enlighten us on this.

Peace
James

 

[RobHom]

What do you mean? What are you saying would happen to such ones if they had gotten hold of a Bible back then?

Nothing would happen to the people…its “what would happen to the Bible”? As in would it be treated as it should be for what it is, or would it be torn apart and used to fill chinks in the walls to keep the drafts out? Would it be used as kindling to light a fire? Would it be read, and would it be understood? No, more than likely not. As it is…very few people are capable of reading the Bible and gathering much of the message. Besides, in the years past, prior to Bibles being printed in common languages…it was printed only in Latin, or Greek…How many people could read those languages? Not many outside the Church.

What happens TODAY when an “illiterate” person reads the Bible?

More than likely what happens is very little if anything. Illiterates cannot read and comprehend written words. And just so there is no confusion as to the word “illiterate” here is the Websters definition:

Main Entry:
il·lit·er·ate Listen to the pronunciation of illiterate
Pronunciation:
(ˌ)i(l)-ˈli-t(ə-)rət\
Function:
adjective
Etymology:
Middle English, from Latin illiteratus, from in- + litteratus literate
Date:
15th century

1: having little or no education; especially : unable to read or write
2 a: showing or marked by a lack of familiarity with language and literature b: violating approved patterns of speaking or writing
3: showing or marked by a lack of acquaintance with the fundamentals of a particular field of knowledge
synonyms see ignorant

So you can see that to an illiterate person…a Bible is nothing more than a bunch of paper in a lump or bound between two covers… A semi-literate person would misunderstand it, and would mis-interpret it. I have no doubt about that. Afterall, far too many self-proclaimed “Biblical Scholars”…misinterpret the Bible every time they attempt to “interpret it”.

Your stements here are ridiculous.

Hardly, though I am want to suggest that your ability to discern the written words as they appear on the screen before your eyes is sorely limited. I speak truth, you have a problem accepting truth. So be it. You are insincere in your claims. Perhaps playing in a sandbox of kindred spirits would be more to your liking…

So far…Protestant 101, the only thing you’ve said that is honest is that little ditty in your signature…you know the one…“Truth is often the opposite of allegation”. Its too bad you can’t see that as fact where it applies to you. My friend, reach out and grasp the truth…it will set you free!

 

[RobHom]

The “licensing” issue is more dithering hyperbole foisted on the gullible …by the dishonest purveyors of disinformation and propaganda.

There is no mention of any “licensing” in any Bible I own. They all have “copyrights” that protect the publishers, along with shared copyrights…that only limit reproduction of the book without permission of the copyright owner. That in and of itself is of no great concern as just about every Bible version is in the “public domain” and available on the internet.

That website contains nearly as much “truth” as the average piece of garbage “chick tract”…and that is zero.

 

[redrosetea]

I have never heard of any licensing of our Bible in my entire life

Do you just start this kind of thread to be offensive ?

 

[RobHom]

I have never heard of any licensing of our Bible in my entire life

Me neither… (Edited)

Do you just start this kind of thread to be offensive ?

Me thinks maybe he do. Surely seems that way.

Protestant101… I can’t remember which thread it was, but you posted that (Edited) statement that “Jesus was a Protestant”… (Edited) Well, (Edited)…here’s the proof that you are WRONG:

**Epistle Of Saint Paul To The Romans
< prev | Chapter 9 | next >

The apostle’s concern for the Jews. God’s election is free and not confined to their nation.

1 I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost: 2 That I have great sadness, and continual sorrow in my heart. 3 For I wished myself to be an anathema from Christ, for my brethren, who are my kinsmen according to the flesh, 4 Who are Israelites, to whom belongeth the adoption as of children, and the glory, and the testament, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises: 5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom is Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all things, God blessed for ever. Amen. **

Case closed.

 

[Protestant101]

As it is…very few people are capable of reading the Bible and gathering much of the message.

Besides, in the years past, prior to Bibles being printed in common languages…it was printed only in Latin, or Greek…How many people could read those languages? Not many outside the Church.

I have seen people who could barely speak English, from another country, and they bought the Bible on cassette from me so that they could learn English better. And as it turned out, she learned much more than “English!!”

When you say “very few people;” it borders on pretense and falsehood

 

[Protestant101]

The “licensing” issue is more dithering hyperbole foisted on the gullible …by the dishonest purveyors of disinformation and propaganda.

That website contains nearly as much “truth” as the average piece of garbage “chick tract”…and that is zero.

The first line is quite a mouthful. Hmmm, who are these “gullible ones” that all this has been “foisted” upon. You don’t make one bit of sense, much less prove anything that could be called “truth.”

Perhaps the reason for your hate speech against Protestants is just that…You don’t have to press the panic button whenever you find someone with different beliefs than you; and that you cannot refute by the Bible