Sola Scriptura doesn't exist

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JTBT said:
Read the scriptures for yourself and try to understand, if you don’t understand appeal to tradition.
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But how do you know if you’re understanding correctly?
tealblue said:
Actually the real issue is if our Tradition goes against YOUR interpretation of scripture. What happens if one interpretation goes against another interpretation? Which one is rejected? The obvious answer is the other person’s of course because your view of scripture is always right.
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Therin lies the rub…
 
Newbie2 said:
But how do you know if you’re understanding correctly?
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I can look at the fathers of the church as easily as you can.
don’t you see that you argument can be flipped back on you, how do you know you are understanding the Catholic Church correctly?
 
JTBT said:
Historic Apostolic Teaching
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Ok. By this, I’m assuming from the rest fo the thread that by “apostolic”, you’re including the universal teaching of the bishops since the apostles as well, not just the apostles themselves, yes?

SK
 
JTBT said:
I can look at the fathers of the church as easily as you can.
don’t you see that you argument can be flipped back on you, how do you know you are understanding the Catholic Church correctly?
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Sure.

It’s pretty easy to understand…but, your point is taken. In the RCC, we have real live people who’s interepretations we can access, and a whole magisterial system keeping true to the proper interpretation of Scripture. You don’t get much of that anywhere else.

That’s not to say, though, that there are never disagreements within theologians (granted, outside of the magisterium) on interpretation of scripture, but all in all, when it comes down on doctrine or dogma, it’s been throughly investigated by the best there is.

This argument can be taken to reduction absurdio though, “how do we know what ‘is’ means?” 😉
 
SilentKnight- Thank you for your (name removed by moderator)ut. My thread was saying that sola scriptura does not mean that others things are not also important, which they certainly are, but that none can rise to the level of the Word of God as ultimate authority. After I re-read what I had written I see that it can be understood differently.
Your points on tongues and baptism are well taken and people out there believe a plethora of things, but basically salvation can be viewed in one of three ways: either faith alone or faith+works or works only and as a generalization protestantism, catholicism and judaism (leaving out other belief systems which are by man’s doings) fall in one of these categories.Did not intend to get off the subect of S.S.
Also after reading the first 28 threads it appears as if some argue that the one who was there first has the right of ultimate interpretation or ownership of Jesus apostolates and ultimate successors of them. Also the recipients of the scriptures and rightful owners of the title of the Church of Christ. I think God is being left out of the picture.Sure, Jesus left Peter and other disciples the keys of the kingdom but this is for all believers who are made king and priests, ambassadors for Christ,as we pass on the gospel news to a perishing world. The church in Col. &Ephes. is the body of Christ, spiritual not a physical institution and God left His words which this body of Christ recognized as inspired (it was not for man to decide what was or was not inspired but to recognized what He had left for us). Jesus knew what was in man, would He leave it up to mankind to decide? I think a wise God was the chooser of all the books in the bible and not man.
Lastly SK, Ijust reviewed your thread #20 and wholeheartedly agree with you and hope my words here are taken in the spirit of edification and charity that I intend.
God bless, TITO.
 
SilentKnight said:
Ok. By this, I’m assuming from the rest fo the thread that by “apostolic”, you’re including the universal teaching of the bishops since the apostles as well, not just the apostles themselves, yes?

SK
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I’m counting apostolic teaching, if a Bishop held to it then yes he is included, if he did not then no I would not include that Bishop, no matter what city he was Bishop of …
 
Here’s my problem with traditions of men,the tradition may have started out correct,but its just like,if I were to tell someone something and tell them to pass it on,by the time it gets back to me,heck!maybe even a few people from me,the story is totally different from what I said.

Now what you all will probably say is that God kept all of that from happening,to which I reply,how can you make that claim,when He didnt even feel the need to keep out the evil popes that are supposed to date back to Peter.

And again the majority of Catholic traditions originate from paganisim,so I really can’t be sure if it started out correctly.

Someone said its my interpretation of scripture that could be flawed,but what the Catholic does is twist scripture to meet tradition instead of using scripture to expose the traditions that are not right
 
tito said:
Also after reading the first 28 threads it appears as if some argue that the one who was there first has the right of ultimate interpretation or ownership of Jesus apostolates and ultimate successors of them. Also the recipients of the scriptures and rightful owners of the title of the Church of Christ. I think God is being left out of the picture.Sure, Jesus left Peter and other disciples the keys of the kingdom but this is for all believers who are made king and priests, ambassadors for Christ,as we pass on the gospel news to a perishing world.
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The heirarchy of the Church definitely exists to serve the Lord and to bring the good news of salvation to the world, not for its own sake. Yes.
The church in Col. &Ephes. is the body of Christ, spiritual not a physical institution
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It has to be both, though, Tito if verses such as Matt 18:17 are to be understood. How is one to take an issue to “the Church” (or to a fellow brother, for that matter) if one cannot see where “the Church” is in the first place? This verse is one of many that causes problems if we try to understand the Church as a strictly invisible body of believers.
and God left His words which this body of Christ recognized as inspired (it was not for man to decide what was or was not inspired but to recognized what He had left for us). Jesus knew what was in man, would He leave it up to mankind to decide? I think a wise God was the chooser of all the books in the bible and not man.
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I think so too! The problem with this is would Jesus leave it up to man to write these books infallibly in the first place? Of course not. So, if he prevented man from erring in the writing of Scripture, can he not also prevent man from erring in its interpretation and its “fleshing out” over time, we might say? I think you would agree with me that he can. So, the question then becomes, does he? Or did Jesus simply leave us an infallible book with which to fallibly generate our own versions of the faith? Or, rather, did he not only provide an infallible document, but an infallible interpetation as well, along with infallible interpreters? (Infallible because Jesus prevents them from erring, not because they have some special power of their own.)
Lastly SK, Ijust reviewed your thread #20 and wholeheartedly agree with you and hope my words here are taken in the spirit of edification and charity that I intend.
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Absolutely. 👍

SK
 
JTBT said:
I’m counting apostolic teaching, if a Bishop held to it then yes he is included, if he did not then no I would not include that Bishop, no matter what city he was Bishop of …
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JTBT, I’ve misstepped. I apologize. Let’s back up a moment…

Your original statement was, “Read the scriptures for yourself and try to understand, if you don’t understand appeal to tradition.” Stop there. Why? Under the current definition of Sola Scriptura, where is there room to look to other sources than Scripture itself for final answers regarding the Christian faith? Are you putting Tradition on par with Scripture? (Horror of horrors :eek: 🙂 ) Or are you simply saying that in non-essential matters one should look to Scripture for an answer and if one does not find that answer, then one should feel free to look to tradition for the answer?

SK
 
tito said:
SilentKnight- Thank you for your (name removed by moderator)ut. My thread was saying that sola scriptura does not mean that others things are not also important, which they certainly are, but that none can rise to the level of the Word of God as ultimate authority. After I re-read what I had written I see that it can be understood differently.
Your points on tongues and baptism are well taken and people out there believe a plethora of things, but basically salvation can be viewed in one of three ways: either faith alone or faith+works or works only and as a generalization protestantism, catholicism and judaism (leaving out other belief systems which are by man’s doings) fall in one of these categories.Did not intend to get off the subect of S.S.
Also after reading the first 28 threads it appears as if some argue that the one who was there first has the right of ultimate interpretation or ownership of Jesus apostolates and ultimate successors of them. Also the recipients of the scriptures and rightful owners of the title of the Church of Christ. I think God is being left out of the picture.Sure, Jesus left Peter and other disciples the keys of the kingdom but this is for all believers who are made king and priests, ambassadors for Christ,as we pass on the gospel news to a perishing world. The church in Col. &Ephes. is the body of Christ, spiritual not a physical institution and God left His words which this body of Christ recognized as inspired (it was not for man to decide what was or was not inspired but to recognized what He had left for us). Jesus knew what was in man, would He leave it up to mankind to decide? I think a wise God was the chooser of all the books in the bible and not man. Lastly SK, Ijust reviewed your thread #20 and wholeheartedly agree with you and hope my words here are taken in the spirit of edification and charity that I intend.
God bless, TITO.
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your explanation very vague.

Jesus said to His disciples I will send the HS and He will guide you into all Truth. do you think that He was speaking to the world or He was speak only to a chosen group of man?

since God is not a God of confusion we can rely on the HS according to the promise of our Lord. now how is this done? to whom Jesus promised the HS?
 
SilentKnight said:
JTBT, I’ve misstepped. I apologize. Let’s back up a moment…

Your original statement was, “Read the scriptures for yourself and try to understand, if you don’t understand appeal to tradition.” Stop there. Why? Under the current definition of Sola Scriptura, where is there room to look to other sources than Scripture itself for final answers regarding the Christian faith? Are you putting Tradition on par with Scripture? (Horror of horrors :eek: 🙂 ) Or are you simply saying that in non-essential matters one should look to Scripture for an answer and if one does not find that answer, then one should feel free to look to tradition for the answer?

SK
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Sola Scriptura is not me and my Bible,
your argument is tearing down the strawman of SOLO Scriptura which I and most mainstream Protestants do not hold to.
Sola Scriptura could really be called Scripture primacy, an order of importance if you will, that is
1st scripture (Scripture is suffent to guide one to Christ)
2nd tradition (being what did the church fathers say)
 
I think that in light of the titled topic of this thread, I’d like to see our Baptist friend here make a substantive case that SS does exist as a scriptural teaching. I don’t think it can be done, but I would very much like to participate in that discussion.

Correct me if I am wrong here but could not the title of this thread be rephrased as something like…
Sola Scriptura doesn’t exist…in the Bible
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?As for misunderstandings of definitions of SS, perhaps Jimmy Akin’s article can offer some important information and insight. MATERIAL AND FORMAL SUFFICIENCY
It’s not very long at all and brings out some very important points I think.
Sola Scriptura is not me and my Bible,
your argument is tearing down the strawman of SOLO Scriptura which I and most mainstream Protestants do not hold to.
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My point exactly.
Sola Scriptura could really be called Scripture primacy, an order of importance if you will, that is
1st scripture (Scripture is sufficient to guide one to Christ)
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Problematic, I think, in that if this is the case the apostles could not have evangelized as they did. Moreover, how then did the masses of illiterate people over the first 1400 years of Christianity come to salvation in Christ, since even had they had a printed copy of the Word of God, they would have been unable to read it?
2nd tradition (being what did the church fathers say)
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The problem with this is that there is very substantial evidence that the earliest ECF writings are very distinctly Catholic in their teachings. I’m speaking here of Polycarp, Ignatius of Antioch and the Didache.

Still, I would ask again for a joint Bible study that you can participate in with us here to ascertain if the Bible really does teach Sola Scriptura and thereby resolve the question as to if it really exists, which is what I think the OP meant, right?
 
Sola Scriptura is not me and my Bible,
your argument is tearing down the strawman of SOLO Scriptura which I and most mainstream Protestants do not hold to.
Sola Scriptura could really be called Scripture primacy, an order of importance if you will, that is
1st scripture (Scripture is suffent to guide one to Christ)
2nd tradition (being what did the church fathers say)

Hi everyone 🙂 this is my first day to this forum and I am excited to be a part of it. JTBT that kind of sounds like Catholicism doesnt it? Catholics believe in Scripture and Tradition also. Of course we have the teaching authority of the Church(Praise Jesus because there are many times I have felt like the Eunich in Acts:)). And when you say Church Fathers are you talking about the leaders of the Church after the Apostles?

In Christ
Justin :grouphug:
 
Welcome to the boards jdevoir!

Very good points. I think that JBTB is talking more about scripture being the primary force, and then if all else fails, the person refers to tradition. However, I have not heard of this version of sola scriptura before. It does indeed sound Catholic, but Catholics combine the two rather than having a priority system.

And it is true that the early church fathers all believe things that Catholics believe today, so refering to these men would have conflicting views with most protestants, unless they can have a “personal interpretation” on history as well!
 
tealblue said:
Actually the real issue is if our Tradition goes against YOUR interpretation of scripture. What happens if one interpretation goes against another interpretation? Which one is rejected? The obvious answer is the other person’s of course because your view of scripture is always right.
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Hi All
This is exactly what I mean when I say that some Catholics on this forum are arrogant. You act as if everyone that is Roman Catholic believes the very same thing (All that the RC teaches). I married into a Catholic family. Most of my in-laws come from central Iowa which has a very high population of Catholics. There is a Catholic church in every small town that I know of. We have had many discussions on religion since I’m not Catholic. I was blown away by the ideas that family members had about what the RC taught. I started asking my friends whom I knew were Catholic and found many different interpretations on church teachings as well. The beliefs of the people that go to the non-denominational church where I attend are allot more in unity than allot of the Catholics that I’ve talked to. You say that you are the only ones that the fullness of truth, well I’ve got news for ya. There are allot of different interpretations inside your own church of what your church teaches. Membership doesn’t prove unity, 20 people who believe in the same thing can be more unified than 100 who believe differently.
 
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