Sola Scriptura is not a doctrine

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HarryStotle said:
Discipline doesn’t just float by itself on its own power, so to speak. There has to be some theological, spiritual, or moral reason behind the practice being implemented or imposed.
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A universal belief among Protestants is that the bible is the only expression of the Word of God on earth.
Can that belief be considered a doctrine?
 
It isn’t clear to me that all Protestant groups have doctrines in the same sense as the Catholic Church does, but I would think that it is doctrinal in some. It definitely isn’t doctrine in the Catholic Church because it logically conflicts with what has been revealed – i.e., that which is dogma – because the “sufficiency” of Scripture would have been the guiding principle of the Church from the beginning.

As an example, the circumcision of Gentile converts would have been decided by references to existing Scripture, but the question was decided by the direction of the Holy Spirit to the nascent Church through people like Peter and Paul.

I suppose if you are going to argue that Sola Scriptura is not doctrine as far as Protestants are concerned then you will have to argue that sacred Tradition and the Magisterium or teaching office of the Church are not doctrinal as far as the Catholic Church is concerned.
 
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De_Maria said:
On an anti-Catholic board, I’m having a discussion about what one of our member said,

Paraphrasing, he said that “Sola Scriptura is a hermeneutical principle. A practice to determine whether something is a doctrine. But it is not a doctrine, itself. That is why SS is not in Scripture.”

That sounds totally illogical to me. I say, “Don’t you practice what you preach (i.e. doctrine)?” We do. We preach that a doctrine is valid if it is found in Sacred Tradition and Scripture in accordance with the Magisterium. This is what we preach and this is what we practice and this practice is taught in Tradition and Scripture in accordance with the Magisterium.

It sounds to me as though some Sola Scripturists are making an excuse for the fact that Sola Scriptura is not found in Scripture.

What do you think?
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As I pointed out in my last post, if a Catholic chooses to agree with this “hermeneutical principle” approach on the grounds that “a practice to determine whether something is a doctrine” is not itself a doctrine but, rather, a “practice” or “discipline,” then they may as well be prepared to assert that Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium are also merely “hermeneutical principles” or practices to determine whether something is dogma or doctrine.

Some have argued that hermeneutic practices are “discipline” rather than “doctrine.” Okay. But then, by essentially the same token, so are Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium merely discipline rather than doctrine or dogma.

Seems like a tangled web to me.
 
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FrDavid96 said:
To answer it though, the person quoted in the OP is correct. Sola Scriptura is not a doctrine, it is a method of hermeneutics.

The exception is that for some evangelicals and especially fundamentalists (often these overlap) sola scriptura is indeed a doctrine of theirs.
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Essentially, then, truth is whatever anyone wants to believe it is. There is no objective truth. Throw away the dictionaries. Bad is good, good is bad, night is day and day is night as long as that is what you wish to believe.
 
JonNC said:
My not being Lutheran does not change the FACT that they do not describe SS as Doctrine.
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Just thought of this question. You’ve mentioned that they don’t describe SS as doctrine.

Do they declare, in your official teachings like the Book of Concord, that SS is not a doctrine?

or that SS is only a hermeneutical principle?
 
I think Father David answered your question.
I, too, would like to request that you follow through on his urging regarding the terms.
 
De_Maria said:
Soooo, you’re not going to answer my questions?
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Correct. Not those.
First, there is a presumption that the point is debatable. It isn’t.
Second, we seem to have no agreement on the meaning of terms such as doctrine and discipline, not only in a Lutheran sense, but even in the Catholic understanding.
Soooo, how can we discuss it?
 
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JonNC said:
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De_Maria:
Soooo, you’re not going to answer my questions?
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Correct. Not those.
First, there is a presumption that the point is debatable. It isn’t.
Second, we seem to have no agreement on the meaning of terms such as doctrine and discipline, not only in a Lutheran sense, but even in the Catholic understanding.
Soooo, how can we discuss it?
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Easily. One step at a time. Just answer the questions and we will go on from there.

You’ve mentioned that they (i.e. Lutherans) don’t describe SS as doctrine.

Do they declare, in their official teachings like the Book of Concord, that SS is not a doctrine?

or that SS is only a hermeneutical principle?

The reason I’m asking is because the concept of hermeneutical principle does not exclude the concept of doctrine. In other words, a hermeneutical principle can be a doctrine.

So, I’m trying to find out where you get the idea that they are mutually exclusive.
 
Maybe this is way too late in this conversation…

Sola Scriptura is a teaching with a practice, or a practice based upon a teaching. The teaching is that Scripture is the basis for all Christian Teaching.

And to tell ya the truth, it isnt very far from what the Catholic Church professes.

Celibacy of the ministerial Priesthood is a practice based on a principle which could be called doctrine. But that doctrine does not require celibacy. It only recognizes that the vocation of a single life is a higher calling than a married life. This is Taught by St Paul in Scripture.

But being single isnt a vocation, while ministerial priesthood is.

We teach that the practice of ministerial priesthood celibacy can be removed, and a married man can rightly serve as a priest.

Protestants do not teach that Sola scriptura can be removed, but is a teaching from God. And furthermore, that those who hold Church Teaching authority (and the Traditions which this Church authority call Truth) as having an equal position with Scripture are in error and opppsed to God.

But understanding Church magisterium and Tradition is realizing the relationship of them along with Scripture.

To assign Scripture a place which puts Magisterium and Tradition underneath it (which is the teaching), actually does Scripture an injustice and its practice produces division and opposing doctrines by its very nature.
 
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JonNC said:
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De_Maria:
Do they declare, in their official teachings like the Book of Concord, that SS is not a doctrine?

or that SS is only a hermeneutical principle?
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I’ve already answered this. Please
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On this thread? I must have missed it. Do you have the message #?
 
Your reply to Fr. David96 seems something Polit would have said to Jesus.
 
rcwitness said:
Protestants do not teach that Sola scriptura can be removed, but is a teaching from God. And furthermore, that those who hold Church Teaching authority (and the Traditions which this Church authority call Truth) as having an equal position with Scripture are in error and opppsed to God.
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It depends on the communion. Generalities about what Protestants teach this or do are generally inaccurate, generally speaking. Some do not even use SS and Some may indeed say what you’ve stated.
 
Yes she claims to be, yet you keep hammering on the English content. I did respond to you before …
 
But not from the book of Concord. You keep saying that Lutherans follow that book and the Augsburg Confession. I just want to know if either of those books or any other say, explicitly, that Sola Scriptura is not a doctrine.
 
I have only seen Catholics say that a discipline is not a doctrine. I’ve not seen that from any official Catholic document. What I’ve seen in the official documents is that there is such a thing as disciplines. But nowhere does the Church officially deny that disciplines are doctrines.

In fact, not all Catholics deny this either. I have provided links to two sources, one of them from Catholicism.org and one from CA confirming that a Confirmation textbook taught that disciplines are a type of doctrine.

So, there’s confusion on this matter amongst some Catholics. But not the Catholic Church.

Bottomline is that the Catholic Church doesn’t arbitrarily impose disciplines. The basis of the celibacy discipline is to showforth the ideal of a person who can focus all his attention on God. Whereas, a married person must split his time between family and God. The Catholic Church teaches that celibacy is superior to marriage. That is what this discipline teaches. That is why this discipline along with all other disciplines of the Catholic Church, are first and foremost, doctrines.

1 Corinthians 7:32 I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord’s affairs—how he can please the Lord. 33 But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife—
 
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