Sola Scriptura - Collecting the Arguments

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Dear fellow Catholics and separated brethren:

I need your help.

I’m working on a project to collect and catalog all of the arguments used to support sola scriptura. I’m not looking for refutations or responses…just the arguments themselves. For example:

Argument #1
The Bible teaches that “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Tim 3:16-17)

What arguments have you heard (or used) to illustrate that the doctrine of sola scriptura is true?

Thanks in advance.
 
I hope these help you. They come from Chapter 10 of Karl Keating’s Catholicism and Fundamentalism.

Argument #2

*Everything we need to “believe that Jesus is the Christ” and in doing so, be saved, is already in the Bible.

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name (John 20:30-31).

Argument #3

*Jesus “condemned” Tradition, therefore, what Catholics call Sacred Tradition could never been held in the same regard Sacred Scripture.

Then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, “Why do your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.” He answered them, "And why do you transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? For God commanded, Honor your father and your mother,' and, He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die.’ But you say, `If any one tells his father or his mother, What you would have gained from me is given to God, he need not honor his father.’ So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made void the word of God (Matthew 15:1-6).

See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ (Colossians 2:8).

Argument #4

*The Bible, itself, commands us to “search the Scriptures” and verify the entirety of Truth contained within it.

You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me (John 5:39).

Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with all eagerness, examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so (Acts 17:11).
 
I’ve heard more than once the example of the “Bereans” who consulted the Scriptures to confirm what Paul was teaching them, so therefore, anyone can interpret Scripture for themsel----I mean therefore, Scripture is thus the only source of revelation. :o
 
Read B.B. Warfield. Read Charles Hodge. A.A. Hodge. There are many Reformed authors who have much to say.

One argument for it is probably that since you can’t trust the Catholic Church to teach you or to treat you correctly, based on 2000 years of experience, how can you possibly trust it to get Tradition right? It is whatever they say it is. Whatever valid Tradition we have is contained in the Scriptures. All else is suspect and possibly of human origin or mixture.

A second argument that I can think of is that we have always had the Scriptures. Always. In NT times they had the Old Testament. Jesus quoted the Scriptures against the established church (the Jews) of His time to prove his point. He said “it is written” not “it is the tradition”. He can be reasonably portrayed as being Sola Scsriptura.

A third argument is that the Church has ALWAYS been Sola Scriptura. The sense of the faith of the people of God is that the Scriptures are the ultimate authority, not the bishop or bishops, not some Magisterium, not some mystical tradition. The ECFs built their arguments on Scripture, not on the traditions of men.

Sola Scripturists will compare arguments that are based on the Scriptures as opposed to non-Scirptural sources. Chief of these may be the cult of Mary, based on the unScriptural protoevangelism, and will point to all the unScriptural practices and theologies associated with her.

There are more arguments. These wer just off the top of my head.
 
Randy are you collecting these somewhere or are you trying to find if there’s a good argument for SS out there?
 
A lot of the typical anti-Catholic hate sites like to rationalize sola scriptura around 3 predominant lines of rationale.
  1. Jesus: Quoted scripture, never Tradition
  2. The apostles used Sola Scriptura
  3. Proof Texts (with a limited “infallable” context imposed by their world view)
In case 1 they never allow the simple observation from recorded NT scripture that Jesus HIMSELF practised traditions and was living and breathing tradtion (e.g. presentation in temple, circumcision, passover meal etc.). And then the faux argument that Jesus himself never used oral tradition since when he defended Himself from Satan’s temptations (e.g. Matthew 4:1-11) using only written scripture. Here they will say emotionally: “Jesus THREE TIMES” was tempted by the Devil and EACH time Jesus replied exactly the same three words “IT IS WRITTEN” not “IT IS SAID” to defeat the devil.

Of course they will not allow the admission of the same written evidence that at the time Jesus was also ORALLY teaching new instructions that contravened, simplified or reinterpreted written Jewish laws and teachings that was not to be “written” for many 10’s of years after His resurrection. The whole argument becomes completely circular and selective as to “when” written scripture is permitted to apply.

In case 2 they use a few select texts in Acts (Acts 17:2, 17:11-12, Acts 18-28) to show where the apostles quoted OT scripture to defend themselves but then conveniently forget that none of the other things they are quoting was scripture at that time but new oral traditions. Nor do they mention the fact that Paul even references works of his own that were lost and never got into the NT (a case of written scripture referencing “what was written” but not in canon and therefor tradition).

In case 3 they use 1 Corinthians 4:6 as a proof text forbidding that we use anything other than what is written in scripture before it is even scripture itself - as if Paul somehow knew his words would become NT scripture (which is just maddening to a logical mind). They will also try to say ‘interpreting scripture is so easy that even a child can interpret it’ ( 2 Timothy 3:15 ) but in the same breath they will not permit “the children to come to me” in infant baptism nor account for why there are 32000 seperate “adult” Protestant sects teaching different interpretations.

From here its just variations on a theme - cherry picking verses that they imagine are bullet proof “proof texts” that give different motivations and reasons for using sola scriptura (the standard God judges by, stability and certainty in teaching, scripture command us to listen only to scripture [why are we listening to them then?], etc. etc.

The invalid assumption that Catholic apologetics keep bumping into is that everyone is equally rational and logical and can objectively reason through arguments and forgetting that the emotional and subjective side of the human being is what has to be won over first. Bottom line - it takes the Holy Spirit to open a person’s eyes to objective reason once they have committed a substantial part of their life and identity to an ideal that seems to work for them in theory and also gives them the affirmation and social acceptance of being with like minded individuals.

James
 
MarcoPolo said:
Randy are you collecting these somewhere or are you trying to find if there’s a good argument for SS out there?
Click to expand...
I was asked by someone who I will not name to send him a list of arguments to add to HIS collection for a book project.

So, I figured why not get help from everyone here.

“Many hands make light work”, as they say.
 
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