Mainly For Those Not Roman Catholic: Whom Must You Obey?

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meltzerboy

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From what I’ve read about Roman Catholicism, the Pope’s statements ex cathedra are regarded by the Church as infallible, and perhaps at other times as well (please correct me here if I’m in error), and there are also the teachings of Church tradition and the Magisterium which must be followed. If you are not Roman Catholic, whose teaching in your religion is considered either authoritative or infallible? Is it the Church, the Bible, oral tradition, cultural practice, something other than these, or nothing at all? I’m addressing this question mainly (but not exclusively) to non-Roman Catholics, including Orthodox, Protestants of any denomination, Anglican Catholics, Quakers, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists, Oneness Pentecostals, Unitarians, Christian Scientists, Religious Scientists, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists, Shintoists, Confucians, Pagans, followers of Wicka, Voodoo practitioners, Scientologists, New Agers, or any other religion, sect, or cult.
 
meltzerboy said:
From what I’ve read about Roman Catholicism, the Pope’s statements ex cathedra are regarded by the Church as infallible, and perhaps at other times as well (please correct me here if I’m in error), and there are also the teachings of Church tradition and the Magisterium which must be followed. If you are not Roman Catholic, whose teaching in your religion is considered either authoritative or infallible? Is it the Church, the Bible, oral tradition, cultural practice, something other than these, or nothing at all? I’m addressing this question mainly (but not exclusively) to non-Roman Catholics, including Orthodox, Protestants of any denomination, Anglican Catholics, Quakers, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists, Oneness Pentecostals, Unitarians, Christian Scientists, Religious Scientists, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists, Shintoists, Confucians, Pagans, followers of Wicka, Voodoo practitioners, Scientologists, New Agers, or any other religion, sect, or cult.
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The bible alone with the guidance of the Holy Spirit that Jesus our Lord promised us.
 
I wouldn’t say that there’s a central authority figure who demands that I unquestioningly obey them. I suppose I should say that I obey the gods, but even that isn’t so cut-and-dry.

I suppose you could say that I also consider my personal experience to be authoritative. My tradition looks to the eddas and the sagas for inspiration, but I wouldn’t say that I view them in the same light as a Christian might view the Bible. They’re a collection of (fragmented) stories, meant to entertain, not educate believers in the Norse gods as to how to practice their faith. I’m also inspired by the natural world, even though nature can be cruel as well as beautiful.

However, I should stress that while I find these things valuable, authority chiefly rests with myself. No one else has the right to dictate to me how I should or should not practice religion. Conversely, I have no right to tell other people that they’re "doin’ it wrong?. I might feel the need to express my opinion, but that’s all it is: an opinion. There are Pagan elders who are respected by the general community, but even their statements don’t apply to all Pagans (Paganism itself is extremely diverse, so no one person could possibly speak for everyone.)

I hope that answers your question. Feel free to PM me if you need more information. Sometimes I find it difficult to type out all my thoughts in one post.
 
meltzerboy said:
From what I’ve read about Roman Catholicism, the Pope’s statements ex cathedra are regarded by the Church as infallible, and perhaps at other times as well (please correct me here if I’m in error), and there are also the teachings of Church tradition and the Magisterium which must be followed. If you are not Roman Catholic, whose teaching in your religion is considered either authoritative or infallible?
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I’m a non-Catholic Christian. Protestant/Evangelical. On this particular issue, at least from what I understand, people like me would be extremely similar to people like you.

Please correct me if I’m wrong, but from what I understand, Judaism regards the Tanakh as infallible and authoritative and while there may be other sources of teaching that are highly regarded (like the Mishnah) or people (like your rabbi), they can be no better than second in authority to the written Word of God.

That’s the general idea of what I have going on, the only difference being the inclusion of the New Testament. Other than that, it’s pretty much the same thing. Scripture is infallible and first in authority. There is something to be said for certain codifications of teaching from various theologians in various traditions, and there’s something to be said for ministers/pastors/teachers/priests/disciplers that are held in various levels of fairly high regard, but “infallible” and “first in authority” are not among those things.

There may be some differences between your thing and my thing that I haven’t thought of or I’m just not aware of, but as far as I know, my type of Christians is the type of Christians that’s most like you with regard to this particular topic that you’ve selected. I think you’d be hard pressed to find any group more similar amongst the Wiccans, Buddhists, Pagans, Shintoists, and all them other people you listed as well.

You picked a good topic; I like it. If you have any ideas on what else needs to be considered in such a comparison, I’d be very interested in that since I haven’t really explored it with any practicing Jews to this point.
 
The way that the Southern Baptist Convention is set up, there is no central authority. The SBC is more of a loose confederacy of autonomous churches that may or may not hold all the points of the Baptist Faith and Message, yet still cooperate together for missions etc.

Generally, Southern Baptist churches are going to be somewhere in the spectrum of prima scriptura and sola scriptura. I think stating that one is in favor of strict sola scriptura is a bit nieve. Even the SBC defers to Church tradition for things like the date of Easter, the New Testament canon, and the existence of the trinity. So in reality, we’re probably mostly prima scriptura folks that believe that the Bible is the primary source for Truth, and that Church tradition is secondary and subject to scripture.
 
Great question. The evidant reality is that there is no common central authority outside that of the Catholic Church. This is the unique quality of the CC.
 
In terms of Revelation, we adhere to the entirety of Apostolic Tradition, which consists of written Scripture and the rest of Tradition, which is commonly called “oral” though that is a misleading word since Christianity has developed primarily in literate societies that do not generally transmit information from generation to generation through oral chants and the like (some such oral tradition survived in much of Europe through the Middle Ages and in the Balkans to the early 20th century, but this almost exclusively transmitted secular legends). Non-written Tradition means that aspect of the Catholic faith not explicitly laid out in the Bible but passed on from generation to generation through catechesis, preaching, letters and the like.

As for human authority, necessary among other things to identify and authentically interpret Scripture and Tradition, we follow one man: Christ. We believe that Jesus Christ is not only fully man but fully God, and so entirely trustworthy. We follow Him as our Priest, our Prophet, and our King in both a human and divine sense.

Now, for this age of the Church Christ has seen fit to ascend to heaven and remain present on Earth only in “hidden” ways. Why this is so would be a big tangent. Suffice it to say He did not leave us without guidance, but instituted an authority to continue His earthly ministry by a unique supernatural grace of God.

These are the deacons, priests, and bishops. The deacons are initiated, so to speak, into Christ’s humble mission of service to the world, the priests also into his priestly sacrificial ministry, and the bishops into these as well as His teaching and governing authority. There is an analogy also between these three divisions and the Levites, Priests, and High Priest of the Temple, most clearly on the diocesan level in which there is ordinarily one bishop.

This is the authority structure on the local, diocesan level. But if it were left at that there would be the danger of schism, that is of different parts of the Church breaking with one another and dividing into who knows how many Churches. There would also be the problem of how to resolve theological disputes between different bishops. Christ promised that His Church as a whole would not fail, but by no means that everyone, even everyone with some level of authority (remember Judas Iscariot) would remain faithful. How do you discern which bishop is rebelling against the Deposit of Faith and which is validly interpreting it? How do you tell which side of the schism is the single Church Jesus founded and which is a new one? This is obviously not only a hypothetical problem for the Church.

The answer is that Jesus gave one of His Apostles a special authority above and beyond that of all the other Apostles (and their successors, the ordinary bishops). This position has been compared to the “Master of the Palace” of at least some periods of the Davidic Kingdom. In old European terms the word would be “Vicar.” Today we might say “Prime Minister” and not be too far off. He represents, so to speak, the King, though all his authority ultimately comes from that King not from himself.

Just like the general episcopal authority did not go extinct with the apostles but was passed on to successors, so with the unique authority of Peter. It was, perhaps, passed on in a partial way to the Patriarchs of Antioch (where he has been based for some time) and of Alexandria (where his disciple John Mark was bishop) and by extension the other Patriarchs, but there had to be a single person to hold the unifying role of Peter, so that if there was ever a schism or a theological disagreement the position of the Church as a whole could be discerned by which side the successor of Peter was on. This successor we believe to the bishop of Rome, the Pope.

The doctrine of Papal infallibility flows from this. The Magisterium as a whole is really what is infallible, but how to discern what is the decision of that Magisterium as a whole and what is a dissident opinion among individual bishops? The answer is again the successor of St. Peter, the Pope. The logical consequence is that the Pope Himself can never bindingly teach error on faith or morals, or else the Magisterium as a whole would be doing so. For the same reason an Ecumenical Council is also infallible in its binding teachings on faith or morals. The pastoral decisions of Popes or Ecumenical Councils have their own sort of governing authority as well but are not protected by the same kind of infallibility or the same kind of absolute claim in a believer’s conscience.

As a final thought I must point out that we as Catholic laypeople listen to our priests and especially our bishops for instruction on the faith even if what they say isn’t strictly speaking covered by Papal or Conciliar infallibility. Infallibility provides a safeguard against being seriously led astray by the shepherds of the Church, but the bulk of the bishops’ work is done day to day in a local, ordinary fashion. This “Ordinary Magisterium” is infallible as well (the bishops as a whole won’t lead the Church as a whole astray through their ordinary everyday preaching), but such ordinary teaching by a single bishop can’t be identified as infallible. His teaching is nevertheless to be received with respect as authoritative in a less absolute but still real sense.
 
Let me add that we also accept the authority of the State in a sort of subsidiary way, and most Catholics today would insist on a sort of institutional separation of Church and State in which clergy do not hold positions of secular authority (which could distract them from their more important spiritual duties and even corrupt them) and secular authorities do not have authority over how the Church governs Herself or have a say in things like who becomes the next bishop of an area or the next abbot of a monastery. Unfortunately these things were all too common in the Medieval and early modern Europe, and we learned from experience that it doesn’t work well. All this as opposed to an ideological separation of Church and State in which public officials would not let their positions on issues be influenced by revealed truth, much less a state secularism in which religion is banished from the public square.

We also accept analogous forms of authority like scholarly authority, not as something that could negate Magisterial authority, but still as something to be taken seriously.

And of course we recognize authority within the family, such as the patriarchal authority of husbands and fathers. This may have become unpopular in recent years and may indeed have been badly interpreted and exercised both in the past and in some places today, but it remains a fairly inescapable instance of authority, to which I would personally suggest both Church and State authority are related in some fashion.
 
meltzerboy said:
From what I’ve read about Roman Catholicism, the Pope’s statements ex cathedra are regarded by the Church as infallible, and perhaps at other times as well (please correct me here if I’m in error), and there are also the teachings of Church tradition and the Magisterium which must be followed. If you are not Roman Catholic, whose teaching in your religion is considered either authoritative or infallible? Is it the Church, the Bible, oral tradition, cultural practice, something other than these, or nothing at all? I’m addressing this question mainly (but not exclusively) to non-Roman Catholics, including Orthodox, Protestants of any denomination, Anglican Catholics, Quakers, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists, Oneness Pentecostals, Unitarians, Christian Scientists, Religious Scientists, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists, Shintoists, Confucians, Pagans, followers of Wicka, Voodoo practitioners, Scientologists, New Agers, or any other religion, sect, or cult.
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Hi Meltzerboy!
I will give you my own experience as a Pentecostal.
Pentecostalism does not accept (officially) any form of oral tradition or cultural practice as either infallible or important for discussing doctrine. It’s been a much stricter adherence to the Bible, sometimes referred to as* Solo Scriptura* (as opposed to* Sola Scriptura*), because it literally is all about how one personally views and interprets the Bible (“Scripture interprets Scripture”).

Specifically with regards to the Assemblies of God (my “official” denomination in which i grew up and in which my dad is ordained a pastor), there is a large hierarchy and a council which affirms statements of belief and such. Although honestly you can believe in varying degrees what the official statements say without having to worry, except of course, what is considered fundamental doctrine to Christianity.

And of course, if you’re a cessationist in terms of Baptism of the Holy Spirit/speaking in tongues, it might not be prudent for you to attend one :-P.

I’d like to add:
The Assemblies of God doesn’t consider its statements to be infallible, though it considers itself correct.

Since there are a lot of Jewish sects (and your icon says you’re Jewish), what does the Jewish faith have? Is it simply a matter of different interpretations of oral tradition?
 
Hopefully, I had worded this correctly.

I was taught that Catholics are bound to what the Pope says. Non-Catholics are not.

Sorry, if this is too simple of an answer.
 
Lokabrenna said:
I wouldn’t say that there’s a central authority figure who demands that I unquestioningly obey them. I suppose I should say that I obey the gods, but even that isn’t so cut-and-dry.

I suppose you could say that I also consider my personal experience to be authoritative. My tradition looks to the eddas and the sagas for inspiration, but I wouldn’t say that I view them in the same light as a Christian might view the Bible. They’re a collection of (fragmented) stories, meant to entertain, not educate believers in the Norse gods as to how to practice their faith. I’m also inspired by the natural world, even though nature can be cruel as well as beautiful.

However, I should stress that while I find these things valuable, authority chiefly rests with myself. No one else has the right to dictate to me how I should or should not practice religion. Conversely, I have no right to tell other people that they’re "doin’ it wrong?. I might feel the need to express my opinion, but that’s all it is: an opinion. There are Pagan elders who are respected by the general community, but even their statements don’t apply to all Pagans (Paganism itself is extremely diverse, so no one person could possibly speak for everyone.)

I hope that answers your question. Feel free to PM me if you need more information. Sometimes I find it difficult to type out all my thoughts in one post.
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I didn’t realize there was such diversity within Paganism. Besides your own type, what are some of the others? Also, do you know whether modern Paganism is similar to that practiced in earlier times?
 
Inishfree said:
Hopefully, I had worded this correctly.

I was taught that Catholics are bound to what the Pope says. Non-Catholics are not.

Sorry, if this is too simple of an answer.
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In a way, it’s similar to Judaism. Jews are obligated to follow the laws in the Torah; non-Jews are not, except for certain basic moral principles.
 
FabiusMaximus said:
Hi Meltzerboy!
I will give you my own experience as a Pentecostal.
Pentecostalism does not accept (officially) any form of oral tradition or cultural practice as either infallible or important for discussing doctrine. It’s been a much stricter adherence to the Bible, sometimes referred to as* Solo* Scriptura (as opposed to* Sola Scriptura*), because it literally is all about how one personally views and interprets the Bible (“Scripture interprets Scripture”).

Specifically with regards to the Assemblies of God (my “official” denomination in which i grew up and in which my dad is ordained a pastor), there is a large hierarchy and a council which affirms statements of belief and such. Although honestly you can believe in varying degrees what the official statements say without having to worry, except of course, what is considered fundamental doctrine to Christianity.

And of course, if you’re a cessationist in terms of Baptism of the Holy Spirit/speaking in tongues, it might not be prudent for you to attend one :-P.

I’d like to add:
The Assemblies of God doesn’t consider its statements to be infallible, though it considers itself correct.

Since there are a lot of Jewish sects (and your icon says you’re Jewish), what does the Jewish faith have? Is it simply a matter of different interpretations of oral tradition?
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Is the Assemblies of G-d the same as Pentecostalism or a division of it? I had never heard about Solo Scriptura rather than Sola Scriptura; how interesting!
I wish Judaism were that simple. Oral tradition is part of it; but the main part is following the commandments of the Torah (Pentateuch), which is the Mosaic Law. The oral tradition has been codified in the books of the Talmud, which contain Rabbinical commentaries and opinions about the Torah and applications to the modern world. But no interpretive commentaries, however brilliant, may conflict with or cast aside basic Torah Law.
 
cooterhein said:
I’m a non-Catholic Christian. Protestant/Evangelical. On this particular issue, at least from what I understand, people like me would be extremely similar to people like you.

Please correct me if I’m wrong, but from what I understand, Judaism regards the Tanakh as infallible and authoritative and while there may be other sources of teaching that are highly regarded (like the Mishnah) or people (like your rabbi), they can be no better than second in authority to the written Word of God.

That’s the general idea of what I have going on, the only difference being the inclusion of the New Testament. Other than that, it’s pretty much the same thing. Scripture is infallible and first in authority. There is something to be said for certain codifications of teaching from various theologians in various traditions, and there’s something to be said for ministers/pastors/teachers/priests/disciplers that are held in various levels of fairly high regard, but “infallible” and “first in authority” are not among those things.

There may be some differences between your thing and my thing that I haven’t thought of or I’m just not aware of, but as far as I know, my type of Christians is the type of Christians that’s most like you with regard to this particular topic that you’ve selected. I think you’d be hard pressed to find any group more similar amongst the Wiccans, Buddhists, Pagans, Shintoists, and all them other people you listed as well.

You picked a good topic; I like it. If you have any ideas on what else needs to be considered in such a comparison, I’d be very interested in that since I haven’t really explored it with any practicing Jews to this point.
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You’re correct to a certain extent. Judaism is similar to Protestantism in that the Bible is the ultimate authority; more so the Torah (Pentateuch) than the whole Tanakh (Hebrew Bible). The Talmud (Gemara and Mishnah) consists of rabbinical commentaries, interpretations of the Torah, and applications to modern life. But no Rabbi may radically depart from the Word of G-d as expressed in the Bible. At least no Orthodox Rabbi. Judaism is subdivided into Orthodox (Torah Judaism) as well as Conservative and Reform. The latter two (especially Reform Judaism) depart from Torah Judaism, so much so that Orthodox Judaism does not recognize the legitimacy of these branches or their Rabbis, and considers both divisions heretical movements. However, most Jews abide by the Thirteen Principles of Judaism as expressed by the famous Rabbi Maimonides (aka the Rambam). These constitute the dogma of Judaism and do not deviate from the Mosaic Law of the Torah. Still, Rabbinical Tradition is also quite important in Judaism, authoritative even if not infallible.
 
If I may interject in this thread (with the sincere hope and intent of not hi-jacking it)…

Who is the “whom” that everyone is referring to when they talk about authority being a book, or set of books?

The “whom” for Catholics is the Magisterium. Those are specific people. They are “whoms”, if you will. Of course, their authority comes from Christ, and if it were not so, they would not be authoritative. So, in a large sense, Catholic authority is indeed Christ, but since He is not here on earth to clarify teachings, we submit to His appointed teachers and their ordained successors. We believe that is God’s plan for the formation of all people.

So who is the “whom” for those not specifying authoritative individuals, but rather - authoritative texts? Is it the Holy Spirit? Is it one’s self as guided by the Spirit? Is it a teaching authority of certain people? Certainly it is not the physical book(s) themselves, so who is the whom?

And if it is the Spirit of God, a follow on question would be…do you therefore concede that the pastors/preachers/rabbis/etc. of your religion are infallibly guided by said Spirit? If not, how do you fully submit to the teachings to which you’ve been exposed? IOW, if you cannot trust that someone who has taught you that which you now believe has been infallibly gifted with truth, how can you trust that what you believe is, in fact, truth?

If it is one’s self as guided by the Spirit, the same follow on question applies - do you concede that you, yourself, are infallibly gifted with truth so as to know you are not in error in your beliefs?

Thanks!
 
meltzerboy said:
I didn’t realize there was such diversity within Paganism. Besides your own type, what are some of the others? Also, do you know whether modern Paganism is similar to that practiced in earlier times?
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There’s a lot to cover! It’s almost like asking about the many different denominations within Christianity! “Paganism” is actually an umbrella term for many, many different traditions, on the one hand, you have traditions like Wicca, which is very eclectic in nature and draws from many different traditions, and there are also reconstructionist traditions: Asatru (Norse), Hellenismos (Greek), Kemetic (Egyptian), which attempt to reconstruct the religions of long ago, and some (like me) are neither reconstructionists or Wiccans, and take a more “eclectic” approach to their practice. They might be called “neopagans” or “eclectic Pagans” to differentiate them from the more culturally specific reconstructionist groups, and of course, there are people who don’t use these labels at all.

Are you confused yet? 🙂 My point is that there’s so much diversity within Paganism that it’s almost impossible to make blanket statements about it. There’s a joke that I’ve seen: “Ask ten Pagans a question and you’ll get twelve answers” and it’s true.

I’d recommend checking out the Cauldron’s Pagan Primer if you want some information from actual practitioners: ecauldron.net/newpagan.php

As for your question, even the most hardcore reconstructionist will admit that it is impossible to practice in exactly the way that our ancestors did. A lot of people make the mistake of confusing reconstruction with reenactment. No one that I know wants to bring back religiously sanctioned slavery, or human sacrifice, for instance. They are, first and foremost, modern religions, perhaps modern revivals of ancient religions, but the idea is to take the religions of the past and bring them into the present, not to live in the past.

I’ve probably gone on enough about the various Pagan religions and I know everyone probably wants me to be quiet so they can answer your question. 🙂 Great questions, by the way.
 
SteveGC said:
If I may interject in this thread (with the sincere hope and intent of not hi-jacking it)…

Who is the “whom” that everyone is referring to when they talk about authority being a book, or set of books?

The “whom” for Catholics is the Magisterium. Those are specific people. They are “whoms”, if you will. Of course, their authority comes from Christ, and if it were not so, they would not be authoritative. So, in a large sense, Catholic authority is indeed Christ, but since He is not here on earth to clarify teachings, we submit to His appointed teachers and their ordained successors. We believe that is God’s plan for the formation of all people.

So who is the “whom” for those not specifying authoritative individuals, but rather - authoritative texts? Is it the Holy Spirit? Is it one’s self as guided by the Spirit? Is it a teaching authority of certain people? Certainly it is not the physical book(s) themselves, so who is the whom?

And if it is the Spirit of God, a follow on question would be…do you therefore concede that the pastors/preachers/rabbis/etc. of your religion are infallibly guided by said Spirit? If not, how do you fully submit to the teachings to which you’ve been exposed? IOW, if you cannot trust that someone who has taught you that which you now believe has been infallibly gifted with truth, how can you trust that what you believe is, in fact, truth?

If it is one’s self as guided by the Spirit, the same follow on question applies - do you concede that you, yourself, are infallibly gifted with truth so as to know you are not in error in your beliefs?

Thanks!
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Excellent question! Insofar as Judaism is concerned, none of the branches (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist) believes that absolute truth can reside in any one human. The notion of human infallibility is not present in Judaism, even among Rabbis or, in ancient times, Prophets. However, we do believe that Moses (our greatest Prophet) was divinely inspired by G-d when he wrote the Torah (Pentateuch) and so every word is in effect from G-d. The interpretation of some of the more challenging passages of the Torah must be based on our best human effort by means of former esteemed Rabbis as well as present-day Rabbis and Hebrew scholars. And so there are conflicting commentaries, disagreements, debates, controversies, arguments with regard to the finer details and more obscure verses of the Bible. This notion of debate between men, and even between man and G-d, is not foreign to Judaism. As I mentioned before, the less Orthodox branches–Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist–go much further in their interpretations than Torah Judaism: a little too far according to more Orthodox Jews. But Judaism can and has survived these different points of view, because the basic dogma is firmly stated in the Torah, and on that there is little or no disagreement; and also because Judaism is an orthoprax religion more than an orthodox faith. In other words, it is a way of life more than a dogmatic creed.
 
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