J
joe370
Guest
Most history books are not inspired, and many are written by those with activist intentions in their writings. One of the things I am trying to question here, is that do we really NEED history to determine Biblical inspiration, or “canonization?”
All of the doctrines of the C.C. were decreed to be truth the same way the Bible was decreed to be truth. The Bible did not decree itself, as you seem to claim. Most of the books of the NT canon, 20 of the 27, were well accepted by the majority of believers. It is the remaining seven books – James, Hebrews, II and III John, II Peter (especially), Jude and Revelation – which were debatable. And as if that were not enough, there were scattered churches in the first few centuries that accepted apocryphal books as authoritative – The Didache, and The Shepherd of Hermas, I and II Clement, and The Gospel of Barnabas to name several. And then there were the nearly universally rejected books such as The Gospel of Thomas, and The Gospel of Peter among others.
The problem is quite obvious! There needs to be someone telling them which books are authoritative and which ones were not, both within the debatable inspired seven and the debatable apocryphal books that Christians at one time accepted as part of Scripture. The decrees and decisions set by the Council of Hippo and the Council of Carthage were the deciding factors of the Christian Scriptures. The final list was submitted to the Bishop of Rome for approval and then became binding upon the whole Christian community once approved. The books were constant throughout the centuries and did indeed include what you call the “Apocrypha.”
The funny thing about these so-called “apocryphal” books of the Old Testament (seven books) is that Luther took them out of the Bible with his idea of individual interpretation. No, you say! The Catholic Church put them in the Bible during this time, and Protestants have the true Scriptures! That is flawed history and propaganda at its best. Look at the decisions of the councils first, then look at the Bible of the Eastern Orthodox Church for proof. Well, why the Eastern Orthodox Church, what do they have to do with this? They split from the Church of the West (Rome) in the middle of the 11th century, 450 years before Luther. Contained inside their sacred Old Testament Scriptures are these Holy Canonical Books of God’s Word, what Protestants call “apocryphal,” or false. They were decreed to be God’s Word the same way that the New Testament was decreed and existed that way for centuries until Luther essentially removed them from the Bible; from the very hands of the Catholic Church that gave it to him.
Luther also was content to diminish seven New Testament books, but thankfully, and to their credit, some of his more conservative reformers prevented him from removing them. But it needs to be said of Luther, that he was perhaps the most devoted to actually “reforming” the Catholic Church, as opposed to Calvin and Zwingli and the others.
In regards to the New Testament canon, in Lee Strobel’s outstanding book, The Case for Christ, Bruce M. Metzger, speaks of the canon of Scripture, though he does so as if it were all predetermined. I will list a couple quotes and then discuss the thoughts of each:
"You have to understand that the canon was not the result of a series of contests involving church politics. The canon is rather the separation that came about because of the intuitive insight of Christian believers…the canon is a list of authoritative books more than it is an authoritative list of books…for somebody now to say that the canon emerged only after council and synods made these pronouncements would be like saying, “Let’s get several academies of musicians to make a pronouncement that the music of Bach and Beethoven is wonderful.” I would say, ‘Thank you for nothing! We knew that before the pronouncement was made.’ " [emphasis added]
When Strobel asked about the seven books that took longer to place into the canon, Metzger replied,
“To my mind, that just shows how careful the early church was…This shows deliberate and careful analysis…” [emphasis added]
Strobel is not questioning Metzger about the authority of the Catholic Church. Therefore, we cannot assume that his answers would be the same if he was, but we can assume that they would be very similar since it deals with the same subject matter. Let’s examine the first quote.
The problem lies within the fact that he is stating that the authority lies in the books alone, and not those who decide which books are Scripture. In truth, both the Scripture and the decision must be infallible, otherwise we are building our foundation on sand and not Rock. We can have all of the intuitive insight that man is able to possess, and use deliberate and careful analysis as prot.101 uses, until the sun sets its last, but Christian people have been doing that for centuries with multiple goals – not just determining Scripture, yet this determination of Scripture is accepted by all believers. And it seems that Metzger contradicts himself in the above statement because in one sense he declares that “we already knew before the pronouncement was made,” and yet several moments later he says how careful the early church had to be. How careful? But I thought he said this was clearer than crystal? Evidently not.
And this is where I thought Protestantism would fail, and lo and behold, after the investigation I was right. Coincidence? I disagree. Protestantism, by its very nature, absolutely must place all authority in Scripture, because to have authority in man (albeit man led by the promise of the Holy Spirit) is to be…well…Catholic. Protestantism has no choice, whatsoever, so it inevitably must find ways to place all authority in Scripture. And history is all too clear at what chaos and divisions that produced.
So why do people accept the bible? We accept it because the apostolic C.C. was inspired by the Holy Spirit the same way the councils are inspired by the Holy Spirit today. The authority comes from God, as do all things Holy. If we accept the determined Scripture as God’s Word, then by Jesus Himself I do hope and pray that we know who we are trusting and believe that their decision is infallible.
How in the world can people accept the council’s decisions as not having authority? And on what authority do you believe the Bible as we have it today, is the true Word of God? The Bible itself certainly doesn’t say so. Around and around we go, until we realize that the infallibility to discern such things was and is present in such Councils. Sola scriptura is wrong; our faith requires that it is wrong, otherwise we have no binding decision on which to base our faith in the Word of God. We could base it on other people’s decisions such as those who accepted the apocryphal Gospels, like The Gospel of Barnabas – but we do not. Why? Why accept the finalized council decision? We could accept the Mormon Bible on faith – but we do not. We could accept on faith the individual interpretations of men in the early centuries on what is and what is not Scripture – but we do not, for the last seven NT books anyway.
Rather, Christians today accept a decision by a group of Catholic men (and Catholic they were indeed, as by this time Rome was formally Christianized and the term “Catholic Church” was synonymous with the “Christian Church”) who acted in the same way as Catholic Councils act today. It was a convening of bishops from various provinces, all watched under the authority of the Bishop of Rome, and then ratified by Rome. These councils are authoritative, they must be authoritative otherwise there is no definite Scripture. The Councils of Hippo, Carthage, Florence, and the Council of Trent in an attempt to nullify the so-called Reformation are all Councils, as was Vatican II this last century. **Their decrees were decreed the same way the Bible was decreed. **If you accept the Bible, by the same logic, and ultimately by the same faith, you must accept their decisions as God’s will as the Bible came about the same way other decrees came about – Purgatory, Mary, the seven Sacraments and so on.
On what authority do we accept the Bible as being written by inspired men? The Bible certainly does not say so for every book contained within because it simply was not in existence (in so far as all Scripture being known) until it was ratified. It was and is the Catholic Church that decrees, protects, and delivers the true Word of God in my opinion and its meaning to the faithful.
You cannot understand Catholic theology looking through Protestant eyes. You cannot go into discussions or debates with certain presuppositions such as the “Bible alone” and not be willing to toss that out for at least a little while. There was no Bible in the early years, and if people wanted to argue “Scripture alone” back in the day before the canon, well then we would have a heck of a mess because there were a lot of fallible Scriptures back then. One could and would have pulled out 1 Clement or such a book and debated for hours because it was believed by some to be Scripture. Hence, the need for a council, as the Church has always done since Acts 15. It’s just developed over time and remains the same Church then as today. Hence, the decision of the canon must be authoritative.
Just take a look at the different denominational doctrines – they’re either right or they’re wrong. In my opinion there is no better place to worship God than in the Catholic Church, the bulwark of truth He established (1 Tim 3:15) and from which all truths – the Bible, Traditions, and further revelations come from.
St. Augustine, in 397 AD, around the time of the canonization of the Bible, wrote:
“…And so, lastly, does the name itself Catholic, which, not without reason, amid so many heresies, the Church has thus retained; so that, though all heretics wish to be called Catholics, yet when a stranger asks where the Catholic Church meets, no heretic will venture to point to his own chapel or house. Such then in number and importance are the precious ties belonging to the Christian name which keep a believer in the Catholic Church, as it is right they should…With you, where there is none of these things to attract or keep me… No one shall move me from the faith which binds my mind with ties so many and so strong to the Christian religion…For my part, I should not believe the gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church.” Amen.
Steve Ray, Catholic apologist, former Baptist, recently wrote:
“There is no question that sola scriptura contributed greatly to the chaos we find in Christendom today. Only the Catholic Church has maintained order and theological continuity. Tens of thousands of denominations popping up since the sad day that Martin Luther let the proverbial cat out of the bag demonstrates that. Take our country as an example. If everyone decided there was no need for government, the courts, the laws, and historical continuity, what would happen? What if everyone decided that all they needed was the Constitution and they “invented” a new principle called sola Constitutiona. What kind of chaos would that foster? In no time little sects and cults would arise with their own interpretations of the Constitution and begin building their own little empires. No longer would we be “one nation under God, indivisible”. Funny thing that Protestants are willing to say that phrase from the Pledge of Allegiance about our secondary allegiance, our country; but they don’t pledge such about the kingdom of God which should be our first allegiance. It should be one, unified as Jesus prayed for in John 17. In fact it should be the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. Thank God the Catholic Church has maintained that visible unity and continuity. We invite the rest of the family back home to the fullness of the faith.”
**
Prove to me that the inspiration and infallibility of scripture is proven within it’s own text.across as "fallible; no sarcasm intended; this is a question I could not answer as a former lutheran. If you trust the collection of books codified by the C.C. in the 4th century, why not trust the C.C. What ever reason you give me for not trusting the C.C. makes me wonder why you are so certain the C.C. got it right regarding the word of God.
