Do we argee that each book must pass the test for being inspired?
All the Bible is a “library” of books that the church has put together in one volume. The “list” is the result of each book being “proven” to be inspired.
The NT list is correct but the OT for the Catholic church is not. The problem with the OT are the DC’s which were disputed for centuries.
Who told you it was correct?
The church and the reasons that are given why these works are considered the Word of God.
Do you believe the Catholic Church was led by the holy spirit to chose the books of the new testament without error?
I believe this was part of it but not all. It also required men to use their reason and discussion among each other to finalize it. Its not like the HS gave anyone one man what the canon was to be. Rather it was a process that took time.
Men are fallible and Scripture warns that false teachers will come into the church itself and decieve many. Once the church understood what the canon of Scripture was and what Scripture is i.e. inspired-inerrant Word of God, then it means that the Scripture is the standard by which all doctrines and practices are to be judged. Men can err but the Word of God cannot.
This is true. But none of the books contain a list of which books should be included in the canon.
Yes. One of those “tests” was whether or not there was anything in the book that was inconsistent with Catholic Sacred Tradition.
The issue was settled in the early centuries by various “tests” that were applied to these books.
justasking4;4284288:
At least we can agree upon that. At what point do you think this stopped happening. If they were able to make infallible decisions about circumcision, hypostatic union, Trinity, and the canon, when did the Church lose this ability to make right decisions according to the leading of the HS?
The African Synod of Hippo, in 393, approved the New Testament, as it stands today, together with the Septuagint books, a decision that was repeated by Councils of Carthage in 397 and 419. Pope Damasus I’s Council of Rome in 382 issued a biblical canon identical to that mentioned above. Damasus’s commissioning of the Latin Vulgate edition of the Bible, c. 383, was instrumental in the fixation of the canon in the West. In 405, Pope Innocent I sent a list of the sacred books to a Gallic bishop, Exsuperius of Toulouse. When these bishops and councils spoke on the matter, however, they were not defining something new, but instead “were ratifying what had already become the mind of the Church.” Thus, from the fourth century, there existed unanimity in the West concerning the New Testament canon (as it is today), and by the fifth century the East, with a few exceptions, had come to accept the Book of Revelation and thus had come into harmony on the matter of the canon.
No, ja4. This is the major difference between our faith and yours. Your faith comes from yourself - how you interpret the “evidence” and “conclusions we draw.” The Catholic faith is based on Christ, and the Teaching we have received from the Apostles.
I agree that we don’t need 100% certainty, if we did, there would be no need for faith.
The point is, that you have been dodging, is that you reject the Sacred Traditions entirely, yet you accept the most widely dispersed example of of them, the Holy Scriptures.
Actually, it is required. Under the doctrine of SS. As you has testified previously, all doctrines must be “explicitly grounded in the scriptures”. However the canon is not, and neither are the tests that determined the canon. Therefore, you have no authority for your canon at all.
Nice dodge, but it won’t work. You have your back against the wall (or should I say, your collective backsides). You are relying as an authority on Catholic Sacred Tradition, which you said you don’t believe exists.
The African Synod of Hippo, in 393, approved the New Testament, as it stands today, together with the Septuagint books, a decision that was repeated by Councils of Carthage in 397 and 419. Pope Damasus I’s Council of Rome in 382 issued a biblical canon identical to that.
This is true, but it is true about all doctrinal development. It was this way at the council in Acts, the other doctrines such as hypstatic union, Trinity, etc. This is how it works!
It’s ok, ja4, we know you are here, and we are on guard! :knight2:
No, ja4, this is a logical fallacy. The Scripture does not in any way nullify the Word of God that was given to the Church. The Sacred Traditions did not suddenly lose their authority or potency when the canon was finalized. Scripture was never intended to be used for this purpose, but for correction, reproof, and training in righteousness. It cannot arbitrate, because arbitration requires will and intellect. You have "correctly noted:
This is true, and Jesus made His Church this standard. The production of scripture by the church did not change the standard.
The problem with this is that each man interprets scripture through his own filters, and that is why it has so many different meanings to so many people.
Well, we read it differently.
Huh??? There is no getting around your studying the “evidence” for your Catholic faith and drawing your conclusions and putting your “faith” in it. Faith is not something automatic but requires reasoning.
Not always true but lets agree in principle.
I’m trying to figure out what this “Sacred Tradition” is.:whackadoo:
What is established is that the Scriptures are the Word of Lord. Correct? Even though a fallible church has come to the right conclusion it still stands that its conclusion is right and on this basis can be believed.
I’m beginning to think that there are a number of others that are posting under your screen name. There is no way one individual could go from absolute brilliance in some posts to outright embarrassing statements like this one.
The canon of the OT in the Catholic was not “finalized” until Trent. It was at Trent that the DC’s were “upgraded” to full canonical status as the other 39 books of the OT were already.
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Not really. It happens all the time when a person or an organization can be right on some things and wrong on others.
We can study how they arrived at the canon of the NT and look at the methods they employed to determine if they got it right. Take the infancy gospels. They were rejected in part because they did not have true apostolic to back them up and they were written after the apostles died.
Councils did not produce the OT. What they did was to officially recognize what God had already inspired.
I don’t rely directly on the HS to guide me on what books to accept but listen and study the issue from those who are qualified in this field. This works well for the most part. The main problem comes with the DC’s. The Catholic church says they are and most Protestants say no. How do we determine who is right? Look at the evidence for both positions and which is most compelling and convincing? No doubt the DC’s fail the tests for being Scripture.
No one should ever trust absolutely in any pope, council etc. These men are fallen and fallible and can and have erred. Trusting in them can lead to error also. Secondly, there has only been one Man Who has ever lived that it can be said to be infallible and inerrant. I would take His word at face value but I would never do so with anyone else.
This is true. But none of the books contain a list of which books should be included in the canon.
Yes. One of those “tests” was whether or not there was anything in the book that was inconsistent with Catholic Sacred Tradition.
justasking4;4284288:
My understanding is: the sole critirion whether a book went into the New Testament or not was whether the author had witnessed the events. If they had not, or had heard of the information second-hand, it was excluded.The issue was settled in the early centuries by various “tests” that were applied to these books.
At least we can agree upon that. At what point do you think this stopped happening. If they were able to make infallible decisions about circumcision, hypostatic union, Trinity, and the canon, when did the Church lose this ability to make right decisions according to the leading of the HS?
The African Synod of Hippo, in 393, approved the New Testament, as it stands today, together with the Septuagint books, a decision that was repeated by Councils of Carthage in 397 and 419. Pope Damasus I’s Council of Rome in 382 issued a biblical canon identical to that mentioned above. Damasus’s commissioning of the Latin Vulgate edition of the Bible, c. 383, was instrumental in the fixation of the canon in the West. In 405, Pope Innocent I sent a list of the sacred books to a Gallic bishop, Exsuperius of Toulouse. When these bishops and councils spoke on the matter, however, they were not defining something new, but instead “were ratifying what had already become the mind of the Church.” Thus, from the fourth century, there existed unanimity in the West concerning the New Testament canon (as it is today), and by the fifth century the East, with a few exceptions, had come to accept the Book of Revelation and thus had come into harmony on the matter of the canon.
No, ja4. This is the major difference between our faith and yours. Your faith comes from yourself - how you interpret the “evidence” and “conclusions we draw.” The Catholic faith is based on Christ, and the Teaching we have received from the Apostles.
I agree that we don’t need 100% certainty, if we did, there would be no need for faith.
The point is, that you have been dodging, is that you reject the Sacred Traditions entirely, yet you accept the most widely dispersed example of of them, the Holy Scriptures.
Actually, it is required. Under the doctrine of SS. As you has testified previously, all doctrines must be “explicitly grounded in the scriptures”. However the canon is not, and neither are the tests that determined the canon. Therefore, you have no authority for your canon at all.
Nice dodge, but it won’t work. You have your back against the wall (or should I say, your collective backsides). You are relying as an authority on Catholic Sacred Tradition, which you said you don’t believe exists.
This is the criteria used in English [Roman] Law. Heresay evidence regardless how reliable is not admissible. It must be actual witnesses to the events. All other evidence is not admissible.
The councils of Hippo, Carthage and Rome declared the canon and stated that the Deuterocanonicals had full canonical status. It was a part of Sacred Tradition accepted throughout the Church by the time of the Council of Trent. Trent merely reaffirmed what was already established in those Early Church councils, because Protestants were attacking the traditional canon.
Yes, but the Holy Spirit cannot. Those councils were relying on the Holy Spirit as much for the Old Testament canon as they were for the New Testament canon. If they made a big error (7 whole books is a big error), it is reasonable to suppose that they were not hearing the Holy Spirit and that their councils were human initiative and reason. Not God. And if that is the case, then anyone who has different opinions of the material evidence can validly reconstruct the canon in whatever way they see fit.
That subjugates the Scripture to human reasoning. People will come to different conclusions about which books should be included, if it is up to each individual to make his mind up for himself. You know that as well as I. It’s all over the history of the Early Church- I don’t know of any two Early Church Fathers whose canon lists are exactly the same. And none of them are exactly the same as the current Protestant canon. Protestants accept the canon they do through a combination of Catholic Sacred Tradition (the councils of the Early Church that selected the Scripture) and Martin Luther style subjectivism.
We can study how they looked at the Old Testament books in the same way. There were plenty of apocryphal Old Testament books they discarded as well, such as the Epistle of Jeremiah, or the Prayer of Manasseh.
Agreed.
Following this same pattern of relying on human reason and evidence exclusively for the canon, Christians have abandoned the Bible completely and become Non-Christians, convinced that NONE of the books of the Bible are entirely true. In the same way, through human reason and evidence, the Jews have rejected all the New Testament. Following the same pattern, Mormons disagreed with many Protestants and came to feel the Book of Mormon should be included (after all, the Bible doesn’t even say that the canon is closed- only that the Book of Revelation is closed). Following this pattern of human evaluation, Luther removed Jude, James, Hebrews and Revelation from the canon, putting them instead in an appendix at the back- and many Lutherans today still follow his example and view those books as of dubious quality. And Protestants have lost 7 books of the Bible, which, interestingly, brings the number of books in their Bible down from 73 (7 representing, in Scripture, the number of perfection and 3 the number of the Trinity) to 66 (6 being the Scriptural number symbolic of the imperfections of man). A pattern of deceit and error has erupted wherever the traditional canon is deviated from. People make mistakes. Yet you are placing the determination of the books of God into the hands of humans to all figure it out for themselves!
The popes and councils have not erred in teaching on matters of faith and morals. Praise God that He has provided His Church with an infallible teaching authority to guide it, rather than leaving it to human reasoning to determine through fallible tests what books we think are from him, and then to determine through fallible human reasoning what we think those books mean. Praise God that instead, He has revealed His message absolutely clearly, in such a way that human error of interpretation is impossible. “Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches.” Not, “anyone who comes to the right conclusions about what books are God’s Word through careful examination of tests, and then who manages to interpret those books that hopefully are God’s Word correctly, through his own brain power, let him listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches.”
First of all, you don’t know what His word means, as Protestants come to all kinds of different conclusions from one another and from Catholics or Orthodox Christians, so taking it at face value is far from a simple activity.
. It is very fitting and beautiful in this discussion.Are you aware that the Catholic church has infallibly interpreted less than 20 verses of the Scriptures? Secondly, catholics also have their numerous interpretations of various verses and passages and also come to different conclusions.
If this is the case then were all in the same position. You to could be WRONG about your church.
2 separate issues here. One is the writers of Scripture in whom God worked through to produce exactly what He wanted. The same is not true of popes or councils for the mere fact we know of errors that they have committed over time.
Did Moses, the prophets or apostles ever claim to be entirely infallible? Were they always right in what they said and did?
It is said that there are over 200 popes in the church. How many of them claimed to speak infallibly?
Not so. Protestant believe that the canon is closed for the mere fact no writings have ever been discovered to have been written by an apostle or prophet so far. Until something comes up that can be shown to have been written by an apostle or prophet we have good grounds for believing the canon is closed.
Song of Songs is the first book I read when I began reading the Bible again after coming back to the faith. It may still be my favorite book outside the Gospels. (I like to advertise it whenever I can…Ed Rand, thanks for providing that quote from the Song of Songs
) So full of symbolism and analogy. Always refreshing. It’s the perfect compliment to Ecclesiastes–contrasting the futility of “chasing after the wind” with the uncomparable joy that comes from a loving relationship with God, to be but a flower in His garden as “he browses among the lillies”. You’re very welcome. PBWY