Purgatory for Protestants?

[lilypadrees]

As I have told others who refuse to believe that Martin Luther had certain books removed which were later put back in by Bible publishers, do the research. The books were not removed all at once but gradually over a period of years.

And I am referring to the KJV Bible NOT the 1611 version. I am not referring to Luther’s version of the Bible or Swedish Bibles or any other country’s Bibles. I haven’t read those. I have read the KJV which is what I grew up with since one of my parents was a Protestant.

The KJV I owned in the 1970s did not contain the books of what Protestants refer to as the Apocrypha. Neither did the KJV Bibles my maternal grandparents owned, I don’t know what years theirs were published, In the 1990s, I saw my first KJV Bible that had those books returned to it and they were in the back.

Anyone who wishes to continue this mode of conversation may take it up with me in PM.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

the actual practice of praying and offering indulgences and masses for souls in purgatory seems quite elaborate

How is it “elaborate” to pray for the dead?
Sure, you can have a Mass said for them or you can get an indulgence for them (which also helps you with your own spiritual life by encouraging you to pray and perform good works to get the indulgence),
but if you didn’t wish to do all that, you could just as easily say, “Dear Jesus, I pray for the repose of the soul of Deceased Person A”.
Or the simple invocation, “Jesus, have mercy on the souls in purgatory”.

Nothing “elaborate” about either of those methods.

 

[lilypadrees]

lilypadrees:

Again, I am referring to the KJV which is recognized as the officially authorized Protestant Bible.

By whom? This seems awfully narrow. The vast majority of Protestants don’t use this bible.

Yes, the 1611 KJV contained all the books.

Which begs the question, why is Luther getting blamed for removing them?

Source: Every Protestant who doesn’t accept any Bible other than the KJV.

Well this seems quite lame. What authority do they have? And since they are such a small minority, why does their opinion count?

What is it with this (erroneous) belief that KJV is the gold standard for all protestant denominations worldwide? It’s a strawman argument at best.

Well, it appears that @lilypadrees has an affection for straw.

You have the right to your opinion, guanophore. I will respond to these even though you have seen fit to attack me.

I expect you don’t know the majority of Protestants. Nor do I. But those I do know, while they may use various Bibles for study and comparison, believe the KJV to be the only true authorized written of God.

As to why Luther is being blamed for removing books from the Bible, you’ll have to ask Fr Mitch Pacwa that question. He is the one I found it out from.

You will have to ask each Protestant what their authority is to feel the way they do about the KJV.

As for having an affection for straw, guanophore, if it was good enough for the newborn Baby Jesus, it’s good enough for me.

 

[SnowRose]

Perhaps the discussion of Purgatory, Eucharist and so on would be simpler if you would accept that not all protestants are like the ones you encountered in your youth, bless your heart.

Some are, I’m sure. There is a place for everyone. And it must have been vexatious to deal with them. In fact I tend to agree with you about the KJV-only adherents and similar.

But taking that well-ground axe out on bona fide protestants of other denominations risks feeding religious prejudice. On both sides.
And to my mind, prejudice is not a good look.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Did the thief skip purgatory?

Only God knows.
For all we know, the thief could have skipped Purgatory (perhaps because he was suffering his Purgatory on earth by dying a slow, agonizing death on a cross) or he could have whipped through it in 5 earthly minutes.

Jesus’ statement towards one dying person hardly means that all the other billions of dying-but-saved people in the world get to skip Purgatory or that Purgatory doesn’t exist.

 

[GKMotley]

Except for the sola KJVists (a small subset of the protestant zoo) I know of no protestant group that considers the KJV to be the only true authorized version, That includes the Church of England, where the term “Authorized Version” got a start, probably by order of Privy Council.

Might be some out there, of course. The world is wide. Maybe too wide for sweeping generalizations.

My father, a long time Southern Baptist Sunday School teacher (adult men’s classes), used only the RSV.

 

[jtavington]

Most Protestants who primarily or exclusively use the KJV don’t believe it’s the only valid version. They grew up with it and it’s beautiful. And it’s in our bones as native English speakers. But they can and will use everything from the ESV to NLT. The only-ists are the equivalent of reactionary Catholics.

 

[steido01]

You’re contradicting yourself in this very post. Do you realize Martin Luther did not write the KJV or speak a lick of English? That even the KJV had all the books — except in America?

The 66-book canon began as a distinctly American phenomenon and only spread as American missionaries travelled the globe.

Please stop with the false history. Please. It does no help to Christian unity.

 

[lilypadrees]

There is no false history and no contradictions on my part. Kindly do the research yourself.

Again, I do not wish to continue this here. If you have something more to say about it, you may do so via PM.

 

[JonNC]

As I have told others who refuse to believe that Martin Luther had certain books removed which were later put back in by Bible publishers, do the research. The books were not removed all at once but gradually over a period of years.

The reason people don’t believe it is because it is historically false. Luther’s translation was published in 1534. In that version, all 73 books of the typical western Bible were included, plus an additional book: The Prayer of Manasseh, which is a wonderful book, by the way. This was almost 80 years before the KJV.
None of this is in dispute.

The KJV I owned in the 1970s did not contain the books of what Protestants refer to as the Apocrypha. Neither did the KJV Bibles my maternal grandparents owned, I don’t know what years theirs were published, In the 1990s, I saw my first KJV Bible that had those books returned to it and they were in the back.

The fact that American English language bibles - KJV, RSV, ESV, NIV and others were published with only 66 books is not in dispute, but it wasn’t luther who did it.

 

[steido01]

When false information is brought to a public discussion, expect it to be publicly refuted.

Both Roman Catholics and “Protestants” have noted your information to be mistaken. Do not take this as a personal attack; your assertions have been refuted with plain fact. In other threads, even photographic evidence and timelines have been presented to dispel the misinformation.

 

[jtavington]

When did the books start to be taken out on a consistent basis? Is it really an American thing?

 

[steido01]

As to why Luther is being blamed for removing books from the Bible, you’ll have to ask Fr Mitch Pacwa that question. He is the one I found it out from.

Friend, when researching history, I’d encourage you to consult multiple sources. The truth is often clouded by individuals’ preconceptions.

I do not speak ill of Fr. Pacwa, for I’m sure he has done incredible work to expand the Kingdom and bring the Gospel to many. But Fr. Pacwa may not be the most reliable source for learning about the real, historical Luther. For instance, he has also claimed Luther killed a man in a duel — an absurd claim that is built on a strange interpretation of one sentence in a second-hand source, and is only slightly more believable than the idea that Luther’s mother tried to abort him after conceiving him in a bathhouse tryst with the devil himself. (Yes, that was a real claim made by some Roman Catholics at the time - look up Johann Cochlaeus for more entertainment.)

 

[steido01]

Others here can give deeper insight but generally, yes, it was an ‘American thing.’ Well, American churches and British publishers.

Long story short, the Crown controlled printing and shipping of the Bible to the colonies. The more Reformed (not Lutheran) churches in America were often anti-Catholic to the point that they’d consider Lutherans and Anglo-Catholics to be no different from Roman Catholics. They were Puritans, to keep things simple. They were already predisposed to jettison the “Catholic” practices of Lutherans, Anglo-Catholics and Roman Catholics, so publishers took advantage of that fact to ship lighter (cheaper) bibles to America.

Meanwhile, other Anglicans, Lutherans and Roman Catholics in America kept using their 73- and 74-book canons. For Lutherans, that didn’t really change until WWI, when American Lutherans stopped worshipping in German to prove their “Americanness” (for a long time, they were only a half-step ‘above’ the Irish in society). They adopted English translations quickly, and suffered some Reformed influence in the process. It’s been a rough 100 years or so, but lay American Lutherans are slowly recovering their other books - they were never “lost” in Europe, as European Lutheran posters here can attest.

It should be noted that American Lutheran clergy have always studied the Deuterocanonical books, they’ve always been part of American Lutheran liturgies, and they’ve always been considered useful, but less authoritative than other books. This can explain the Lutheran view of Scripture for those interested. It is similar to pre-Tridentine Catholicism.

 

[GKMotley]

A slightly different take on the Anglican story. All English translations, from the early-post Henrician period on, put the Apocrypha (as it they were termed: I think Jerome might have used the same term) in a separate section, the contents varied. The Authorized Version did the same, until the early 1800s, when agitation from Scottish reformed types in the CoE caused the major British Bible publication society to eliminate them as unneeded and divisive. By the time (ironically) that the Oxford movement/Tractarians were getting started, the Authorized Versions no longer carried them.

Anyone is free to doubt this, since it’s mainly vague memory.

 

[steido01]

Thank you for clarifying the timeline. Definitely your area of expertise. Please forgive my quick attempt at a 30,000-ft. view. (Apologies to any Scots-Presbys who I lumped in with Puritans! )

I do think the conversation here is more whether they were included at all, not whether they were in a specific order or section.

If order/appendix is the complaint against the KJV, etc. then some Roman Catholics might be surprised to learn that even their Church’s approved English transalations vary to this day.

 

[steido01]

Were the unauthorized versions the first to cut out the Apocrypha entirely? Was their clandestine publishing the motive for the smaller, lighter book?

 

[guanophore]

Protestants don’t believe Purgatory is real.

“Protestants” cannot be lumped into one group like this. In fact, the vast majority of Protestants don’t believe some of the things you accuse.

In fact, I never met any Protestant that did not believe in Purgatory, they just believe that it happens differently. All Christians believe that nothing unclean can enter heaven, and that God cleanses us from sin so that we can be fit for His dwelling.

Scripture is very clear that, during the second coming,

1 Corinthians 15:52 “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.”

So, if we are not changed before that time, then we will be changed at the resurrection.

They believe in “saved by faith alone” and “once saved, always saved.” They also believe they’re going straight to Heaven because they’re saved (by faith alone).

It sounds like you have been heavily influenced by some Calvanists. Most Protestants don’t embrace the TULIP.

The reality is that they will be judged. Jesus will determine whether they go to Heaven or Hell.

This is not contradictory to believing one will go to heaven because one is saved by faith. In many Protestant theologies, there is a moment in time when a person is justified, at which time judgment occurs for them. They are transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, born again from above. There is a believe that, after this occurs, God judges that sinner by seeing him covered by the blood of Christ. Everyone will be raised to the judgment, but for the person whose life is hidden with Christ in God, their sins will be covered by the blood He shed on the cross. In that sense, the determination that they will go to heaven has already been made.

Since they don’t belive in Purgatory, they better hope they don’t die with any sins on thier souls or their goose(s) is cooked.

There are two problems with this statement. The first is that if there is Purgatory, then it exists for everyone, and persons who don’t believe do not change the fact that it exists. The second is that a person who dies with mortal sin on their soul has a “cooked goose” even if they do believe in purgatory. Purgatory is not some sort of “second chance” a person acquires after death.

JonNC made a post. And I responded to it.

You did, but your response lacks scholarship and authenticity. If you want to keep making the assertion that Luther “removed” books, then provide some credible evidence. “Every Protestant who doesn’t accept any Bible other than the KJV” is not scholarly or credible evidence. Christians who hold this view of Scripture tend to be narrow minded and uneducated. Is that how you wish to appear?

 

[guanophore]

Please do not say things about me that are untrue, guanophore.

This seems like a reasonable request. So please help me to accommodate it by refraining from making strawman arguments! Provide some credible sources for your assertions, or refrain from making them! Unless and until that happens, you will continue to appear as though you have an affection for straw.

As I have told others who refuse to believe that Martin Luther had certain books removed which were later put back in by Bible publishers, do the research. The books were not removed all at once but gradually over a period of years.

And I am referring to the KJV Bible NOT the 1611 version. I am not referring to Luther’s version of the Bible or Swedish Bibles or any other country’s Bibles. I haven’t read those. I have read the KJV which is what I grew up with since one of my parents was a Protestant.

I am sure you believe what you are saying, but it is just a misguided opinion. It is inappropriate to accuse Luther of anything that is, or is not, contained in the KJV.

Anyone who wishes to continue this mode of conversation may take it up with me in PM.

I guess that means you really can’t provide a credible source that Luther removed books from the KJV of the Bible?

You have the right to your opinion, guanophore. I will respond to these even though you have seen fit to attack me.

Requesting that you provide a source for your assertions is not an attack, @lilypadrees. It is part of having a meaningful discussion in the realm of Apologetics. Everyone here is asked to do the same.

 

[guanophore]

I expect you don’t know the majority of Protestants. Nor do I.

There are large segments of Protestants that do not believe the Calvanistic ideas you seem to be taught as a child.

But those I do know, while they may use various Bibles for study and comparison, believe the KJV to be the only true authorized written of God.

Yes, I sojourned for a time among Southern Baptists who believed this way. They did not seem to know anything about the history of the Bible.

As to why Luther is being blamed for removing books from the Bible, you’ll have to ask Fr Mitch Pacwa that question. He is the one I found it out from.

Good! Perhaps you can cite the source? What talk was it? Where is the recording located?

You will have to ask each Protestant what their authority is to feel the way they do about the KJV.

No, lilypadrees. No individual persons “feelings” give them any authority whatsoever to determine what books should be in the canon.

As for having an affection for straw, guanophore, if it was good enough for the newborn Baby Jesus, it’s good enough for me.

Do you know what a strawman argument is?

Perhaps the discussion of Purgatory, Eucharist and so on would be simpler if you would accept that not all protestants are like the ones you encountered in your youth, bless your heart.

This would be a great start!

But taking that well-ground axe out on bona fide protestants of other denominations risks feeding religious prejudice. On both sides.

And to my mind, prejudice is not a good look.

It seems that discovering our prejudices is an ongoing task.