K
KnightIHSV
Guest
I have often discussed the canonical question with Protestant friends.
One recent discussion was on the Cardinal Virtues as set out in Wisdom 8:7
“And if a man love righteousness her labours are virtues: for she teacheth temperance and prudence, justice and fortitude: which are such things, as men can have nothing more profitable in their life.”
My Protestant friend, who was also a lecturer in ancient history, said that Wisdom, as a Deuterocanonical/Apocraphyl book, should be excluded as these ‘cardinal virtues’ it celebrates are actually Greek rather than Biblical virtues. I have tried to chase up what he exactly meant by this and am still not sure, but I think it is that the Cardinal Virtues encourage us in self-mastery rather than in obedience to God’s word. Why the two are inconsistent has never been made clear to me.
For my part, I have always found the stories of the Maccabees, especially the cleansing of the Temple, as analogous to Christ’s own eviction of the money-changers. I have always found the Protestant decision to eliminate such significant histories of the Israelites to be a curious decision.
While I can understand some Protestant critiques of Catholicism, I have never understood the Protestant canon, especially as the battle cry in the 1500s was “Sola Scriptura” which I would have thought solely meant the Bible as it was in the Church of the 1500s, not the (newly renovated) Bible alone as it evolved in the subsequent centuries.
One recent discussion was on the Cardinal Virtues as set out in Wisdom 8:7
“And if a man love righteousness her labours are virtues: for she teacheth temperance and prudence, justice and fortitude: which are such things, as men can have nothing more profitable in their life.”
My Protestant friend, who was also a lecturer in ancient history, said that Wisdom, as a Deuterocanonical/Apocraphyl book, should be excluded as these ‘cardinal virtues’ it celebrates are actually Greek rather than Biblical virtues. I have tried to chase up what he exactly meant by this and am still not sure, but I think it is that the Cardinal Virtues encourage us in self-mastery rather than in obedience to God’s word. Why the two are inconsistent has never been made clear to me.
For my part, I have always found the stories of the Maccabees, especially the cleansing of the Temple, as analogous to Christ’s own eviction of the money-changers. I have always found the Protestant decision to eliminate such significant histories of the Israelites to be a curious decision.
While I can understand some Protestant critiques of Catholicism, I have never understood the Protestant canon, especially as the battle cry in the 1500s was “Sola Scriptura” which I would have thought solely meant the Bible as it was in the Church of the 1500s, not the (newly renovated) Bible alone as it evolved in the subsequent centuries.