Protestant interpretation

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The Catholic church has a rich historical source of scriptural interpretation that dates back to Jesus and the apostles through apostolic succession.(ie:magisterium, church fathers). Where do the protestants get their interpretation of scriptures?

:confused:
 
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Mickey:
The Catholic church has a rich historical source of scriptural interpretation that dates back to Jesus and the apostles through apostolic succession.(ie:magisterium, church fathers). Where do the protestants get their interpretation of scriptures?

:confused:
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Hi Mickey, I get mine from the Holy Spirit. 👍 God Bless.
 
In my experience, the #2 post pretty much sums up the non-Catholic position, yet I find it distressing that there is so much difference in the interpretations of scripture from all these people who claim that the Holy Spirit has guided them. Since confusion is Biblically stated to be the work of the devil (Or at least NOT the Holy Spirit.) I am very uncomfortable with the teachings I see coming out of non-Catholic churches. :rolleyes:
 
Great question! The number 2 post was pretty much the sentiment within the protestant church I was born and raised in. Unfortunately, the Holy Spirit in my former protestant church did not speak with one voice, and so there were many different views on issues like whether women were to have their heads covered; the nature of baptism; the nature of the laying on of hands; the issue of restoring sinners.

In Jesus and Mary
Fiat
 
I’m not a protestant, but it seems to me that protestants also have a rich history of scriptural study and interpretation, dating back to the beginning of the reformation. And, of course, many good faith protestant bible scholars study the early fathers of the church and look to them for help in interpreting the meanings of the scriptures.

But, as the response by SPOKENWORD suggests, that really is all secondary to the perceived direction of the Holy Spirit upon the individual protestant. Rich traditions tend to be dismissed as dangerous “traditions of men” by the more extreme fundamentalists in the protestant camp.

Peace,
 
It is a good question.

Of course the Holy Spirit Guides me but my sinful nature dives me away. On top of that we each have limited mental ability – certainly I cannot know what an Uber Genius in theology would be capable of knowing just as an individual with MR would not be able to understand what I can…

When I have questions I do look to those more knowledgeable than me in the area. Often times it is the Lutheran Church with the Augsburg confession and the like but I do listen to Catholic Answers regularly. I read books by scholarly fellows and look to the Church fathers regularly.

I do believe that the Church as the Body of Christ is important and that it is greater than one man or a collection of men with certain hats or even every Christian in one time period.
 
Church Militant:
In my experience, the #2 post pretty much sums up the non-Catholic position, yet I find it distressing that there is so much difference in the interpretations of scripture from all these people who claim that the Holy Spirit has guided them. Since confusion is Biblically stated to be the work of the devil (Or at least NOT the Holy Spirit.) I am very uncomfortable with the teachings I see coming out of non-Catholic churches. :rolleyes:
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Hi C.M., You see its not my problem,its others. :eek: God Bless
 
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Mickey:
The Catholic church has a rich historical source of scriptural interpretation that dates back to Jesus and the apostles through apostolic succession.(ie:magisterium, church fathers). Where do the protestants get their interpretation of scriptures?

:confused:
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Hello Mickey!

I posted the following on another thread which dealt similarly with the “interpretation” issue. I am reposting here because I think it might be helpful for the dialogue and have posted the link too. I think you will find that this approach to reading/interpreting Scripture is common amongst most protestants - at least the ones I’ve known and spoken with.

"I know most of my personal study has been done in this way:
  1. prayer for enlightenment,
  2. reading the Scripture for myself - several times - and cross-referencing with other passages to get an accurate understanding.
  3. use of concordances and lexicons to get the meanings and listings of particular words and phrases.
  4. use of commentaries and Bible encyclopedias (such as Matthew Henry’s Commentary)
  5. reference theologians and preachers - early and modern
  6. trusted Christian brothers and sisters in local assembly (older ones especially)
  7. local pastors and teachers
    And to get to your last points - when they all disagree with one another - what do you do? and, how do you know what is truth?
    %between%
    The simple answer is that I make a choice based on the information, evidence and arguments given and go with the most reasonable and logical conclusions.
I may not know for sure that what I decide on is the absolute truth. But, for me that’s not a problem. Just as you may not know whether or not you are worthy to go to heaven. As that is the fundamental question of your life - it doesn’t seem to bother many Catholics. I don’t sit around and wonder. I leave my mind open to the possibilities.

What I find interesting is what I mentioned before - Catholics don’t have assurance of salvation but that doesn’t seem to disable you from living your life. The same is true for protestants like me who have assurance of salvation but don’t have assurance of every doctrine and teaching that has come down the pike. What will be will be - if my view is wrong in the end then so be it. If I’ve done my best to reconcile my beliefs with the evidence presented, then the ball is in God’s court. He will have to judge. And we would all agree His judgements are just and righteous."

And the link to my original post is here:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=26065&page=1&pp=10

Peace…
 
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SPOKENWORD:
Hi C.M., You see its not my problem,its others. :eek: God Bless
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Dear brother, it is this kind of rhetoric that is so unappealing. It is also why you have received many unkind remarks. We must always look to examine our own selves - our own motives and intents before we can rightly examine others. You just might find that you are the one with errors. Something to think about. And, here’s a Scripture to ponder:

Matthew 7:3-5

" 3. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
4. Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
5. Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye."

Peace…
 
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ahimsaman72:
Hello Mickey!

I posted the following on another thread which dealt similarly with the “interpretation” issue. I am reposting here because I think it might be helpful for the dialogue and have posted the link too. I think you will find that this approach to reading/interpreting Scripture is common amongst most protestants - at least the ones I’ve known and spoken with.

"I know most of my personal study has been done in this way:
  1. prayer for enlightenment,
  2. reading the Scripture for myself - several times - and cross-referencing with other passages to get an accurate understanding.
  3. use of concordances and lexicons to get the meanings and listings of particular words and phrases.
  4. use of commentaries and Bible encyclopedias (such as Matthew Henry’s Commentary)
  5. reference theologians and preachers - early and modern
  6. trusted Christian brothers and sisters in local assembly (older ones especially)
  7. local pastors and teachers
    And to get to your last points - when they all disagree with one another - what do you do? and, how do you know what is truth?
The simple answer is that I make a choice based on the information, evidence and arguments given and go with the most reasonable and logical conclusions.

I may not know for sure that what I decide on is the absolute truth. But, for me that’s not a problem. Just as you may not know whether or not you are worthy to go to heaven. As that is the fundamental question of your life - it doesn’t seem to bother many Catholics. I don’t sit around and wonder. I leave my mind open to the possibilities.

What I find interesting is what I mentioned before - Catholics don’t have assurance of salvation but that doesn’t seem to disable you from living your life. The same is true for protestants like me who have assurance of salvation but don’t have assurance of every doctrine and teaching that has come down the pike. What will be will be - if my view is wrong in the end then so be it. If I’ve done my best to reconcile my beliefs with the evidence presented, then the ball is in God’s court. He will have to judge. And we would all agree His judgements are just and righteous."

And the link to my original post is here:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=26065&page=1&pp=10

Peace…
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This looks like Chrysostom.

We don’t get ours from Origen.
 
I wish Fiat and C.M. would not refer to me as #2 poster. It gives me an inferior complex.Kind of stinks to be honest with you. 😃 God Bless
 
From now on out I will assume the name of poster #2 in this thread.
 
Dear Ahimsaman72,

You stated:
I may not know for sure that what I decide on is the absolute truth. But, for me that’s not a problem. Just as you may not know whether or not you are worthy to go to heaven. As that is the fundamental question of your life - it doesn’t seem to bother many Catholics. I don’t sit around and wonder. I leave my mind open to the possibilities.
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I don’t think the comparison is quite the same. There is a world of difference between a religious system that pretends we can’t find absolute truth and we Catholics who know what truth is but question whether we are aptly living up to the demands of that truth.

My experience as a protestant in my anabaptist church was that because none of us could agree on the whole interpretation of scriptures, we would marginalize the word of God so that we were only left with those portions we could agree on or at least pretended to agree on: repentance and peace. After a while, it just seemed absurd to me that the God of Creation could incarnate Himself and establish His Kingdom without giving us the fullness of Truth. After I began studying Catholicism, Chrisitianity not only made sense to me intellectually, but also spiritually.

Your brother,
Fiat
 
Hi SPOKENWORD:

I don’t mean to give you a complex. I just thought it would be more charitable if I referred to what you had written as opposed to you personally.😃

Your brother,
Fiat
 
Wait a sec.

If we are talking about the Bible, a vast majority of it the Catholic Church has not made definitive proclamations as to what they mean. At best in these situations a Catholic can only go on what the Magisterium has stated that certain things cannot mean.

When people call into Catholic Answers about certain Biblical quotes and meanings often times you will hear the response – “Well the Magisterium has not definitively answered that question. In truth we really do not know exactly what the verse means, but we do know based on such and such documents that it cannot mean this or that – or that this must refer to this but outside of that the rest is up to personal interpretation at this point.”
 
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Fiat:
Dear Ahimsaman72,

You stated:

I don’t think the comparison is quite the same. There is a world of difference between a religious system that pretends we can’t find absolute truth and we Catholics who know what truth is but question whether we are aptly living up to the demands of that truth.

My experience as a protestant in my anabaptist church was that because none of us could agree on the whole interpretation of scriptures, we would marginalize the word of God so that we were only left with those portions we could agree on or at least pretended to agree on: repentance and peace. After a while, it just seemed absurd to me that the God of Creation could incarnate Himself and establish His Kingdom without giving us the fullness of Truth. After I began studying Catholicism, Chrisitianity not only made sense to me intellectually, but also spiritually.

Your brother,
Fiat
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Hello dear Fiat!

The one thing that struck me about your post was your statement above, "we Catholics who know what truth is ". I believe this explains what I was speaking of. The evidence (in your Catholic faith) points to Christ - Peter - then to his successors as authority for your faith (if I understand correctly). You believe that is the truth. The problem is, we can’t truly put that under a microscope and say definitively - “this is absolute truth”.

Do you see what I mean?

This is the problem. There is evidence for many things for which people will continue to fight over till the cows come home 🙂 . Each side will say they are right - they have the “truth”. This has always been perplexing to me. And, it’s a big reason why I have almost disavowed my faith in any Christian denomination.

So, until we realize that we may not have the “absolute truth” we are really spinning in circles. There cannot be dialogue over issues when one is not open to the possibilty that their faith could be wrong - either the whole system or pieces of it.

I understand your reasoning about the God of creation incarnating and establishing his kingdom and not leaving “fullness of truth”. But, your reasoning begins with something that is debateable - establishing of His kingdom - . When anyone splits hairs - guess what? More hairs are on the table 😃 .

That’s what I have found in my search for the “truth”. The more detailed and dogmatic, the less of the truth I can see. So, I don’t split hairs anymore - I shave my head completely (literally). 🙂

So, unfortunately the dialogue is far from being productive unless we can establish some basics and work our way from there. Such dogmatic statements of establishing kingdoms must be analyzed and dealt with.

Hopefully I didn’t confuse matters more. I am kinda sleepy. :yawn:

Peace…
 
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ahimsaman72:
Hello dear Fiat!

The one thing that struck me about your post was your statement above, "we Catholics who know what truth is ". I believe this explains what I was speaking of. The evidence (in your Catholic faith) points to Christ - Peter - then to his successors as authority for your faith (if I understand correctly). You believe that is the truth. The problem is, we can’t truly put that under a microscope and say definitively - “this is absolute truth”.

Do you see what I mean?

This is the problem. There is evidence for many things for which people will continue to fight over till the cows come home 🙂 . Each side will say they are right - they have the “truth”. This has always been perplexing to me. And, it’s a big reason why I have almost disavowed my faith in any Christian denomination.

So, until we realize that we may not have the “absolute truth” we are really spinning in circles. There cannot be dialogue over issues when one is not open to the possibilty that their faith could be wrong - either the whole system or pieces of it.

I understand your reasoning about the God of creation incarnating and establishing his kingdom and not leaving “fullness of truth”. But, your reasoning begins with something that is debateable - establishing of His kingdom - . When anyone splits hairs - guess what? More hairs are on the table 😃 .

That’s what I have found in my search for the “truth”. The more detailed and dogmatic, the less of the truth I can see. So, I don’t split hairs anymore - I shave my head completely (literally). 🙂

So, unfortunately the dialogue is far from being productive unless we can establish some basics and work our way from there. Such dogmatic statements of establishing kingdoms must be analyzed and dealt with.

Hopefully I didn’t confuse matters more. I am kinda sleepy. :yawn:

Peace…
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ahimsaman. Excellent post. I think that this is a very wise approach. It does not say that there is not truth out there. Neither does it say that the truth cannot be known. But it says that the truth is best understood and preserved when there is a possibility of being wrong. When this is admited, true dialogue and learning can happen. When this is denied, the average person is taken out of the equation and cannot truly understand anything since he or she is not given the right to struggle through many valid option.

Very well put. This is the way that we teach in The Theology Program (www.thetheologyprogram.com). I think that it is the one good thing that Postmodernism has challenged the Christian community on. If there is one thing people reject today, it is absolute dogmatism–not so much that there is truth.

Michael
 
Thank you everyone for responding to this thread. The answers are thoughtful and informative, and opinions are varied. For myself, I enjoy studying the early church fathers and ecumenical councils. History should not be ignored. Those who lived closer to the apostolic era have much to tell us. Some of the early church fathers, (ie:St Ignatius of Antioch and St Polycarp), were disciples of the apostles–and if the apostles had it wrong, then we all have it wrong. Catholic and Eastern Orthodox teachings and doctrine has been consistent for nearly 2000 years. But after the reformation, interpretations and doctrine were questioned. Now we have tens of thousand of protestant groups, each with their own theological differences. If parishioners disagree on something–no problem–divide and create a new group. Obedience is a virtue and I will always trust the collective teaching and doctrines of the Catholic church. No one could ever convince me for example, that someone like Darby discovered something new when he came up with rapture theology. Anyway, thanks again and God Bless you all.
 
Dear Ahimsaman72:

Thank you for your response. I don’t have a lot of time this morning, but I wanted to respond a little. You stated:
The problem is, we can’t truly put that under a microscope and say definitively - “this is absolute truth”.
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I simply don’t subscribe to this sort of deconstruction-post-modern view of things. To say that we cannot know truth absolutely is to say, in essence, that we cannot know Christ. Moreover the standard rebuttal argument to your statement, (which I confess grows a little wearisome), is that to say we cannot know any truth absolutely defeats itself on its own terms by establishing a truth for itself.

I don’t mean to step into the realm of theory and philosophy, here, but the issue I originally intended to address is the notion that within the protestant system truth is determined individually and believed individually, and the individual lends credence to his position by stating that “the Holy Spirit has convicted him to believe this,” or something along those lines. The nonsense of the system becomes apparent when one claims he has the truth of matters despite that “truth” clearly contradicing the alleged truth that the other individual claims he has. As Catholics, we don’t need to worry about finding truth because we believe the fullness of that Truth is already within the Church Herself, regardless of whether individual scripture passages have been defined by the magisterium. Our goal as Catholics, then is to submit to the will of the Father as it has been revealed to us through Holy Mother Church.

In my protestant experience, I noticed that I spent too much time trying to determine what a scripture passage r-e-a-l-l-y meant, as opposed to living my Christian faith. Contrary to what some non-Catholics argue, I have found that living my Catholic faith is far more liberating than my protestant, anabaptist experience was.

Your brother,
Fiat
 
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michaelp:
ahimsaman. Excellent post. I think that this is a very wise approach. It does not say that there is not truth out there. Neither does it say that the truth cannot be known. But it says that the truth is best understood and preserved when there is a possibility of being wrong. When this is admited, true dialogue and learning can happen. When this is denied, the average person is taken out of the equation and cannot truly understand anything since he or she is not given the right to struggle through many valid option.

Very well put. This is the way that we teach in The Theology Program (www.thetheologyprogram.com). I think that it is the one good thing that Postmodernism has challenged the Christian community on. If there is one thing people reject today, it is absolute dogmatism–not so much that there is truth.

Michael
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Thank you dear friend.

Not bad for a heretic baptist with no formal training, huh? 😉
Just kidding.

Actually, with my personal study of world religions, I have come a long way in the understanding of different cultures and how they view the world through their religions. It’s very refreshing to look at a Buddhist - for example, and pick their brain to see how they come to their conclusions about the world. It *forces *you to look at yourself and say - “I’ve never thought of it that way”. A light bulb goes off in your head.

We get so tied up in proving our faith and our thoughts that we further constrict our flexibility and openness to truth that is all around us. The more I have studied and researched, the more I become strained and disillusioned with many aspects of my Christian faith. This forum proves my point. You and I can debate with Catholics all day long, but until we sit back and think about our world and seek the truth, instead of thinking we have the truth, we cannot progress spiritually.

Thank you for your continued kind words and encouragement.

Peace…
 
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