Re: Moving away from the topic of boys
Submitted by ATN on 2002-09-1 14:07:21, Sunday
In reply to Moving away from the topic of boys submitted by Drifter on 2002-08-29 13:30:20, Thursday
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Hi Drifter, Thank you for the thought provoking post. It is an issue I have thought about as well. Personally, I have been unable to find the Roman Catholic position tenable, for a number of reasons. It is obvious that if anybody had authority to talk of Christ and to speak with authority on Christianity, it was the apostles. This was because they knew the most about Christ, and best understood his message. Several times Paul makes it clear that it is a Message, not men (except Christ) that is to be followed. So, if the Apostles wrote the books, then I am willing to accept them as the authoritative statement of Christianity. Now, you may raise the question, how do we know they did? Do we not have to accept the word of others? First, this is an interesting question -- we accept without any infallible authority at all that Homer wrote the Iliad and Vergil wrote the Aeneid. I doubt that it has ever occured to us to doubt this. Why then, when there is at least as good (and in many cases better) evidence that the Bible was written by the supposed authors, would we deny that? It is a matter of scholarship and research, history, not inspiration. The Church defined the Bible based on what they perceived to be the truth of its authorship. Modern scholars discuss it on the same thing. Now, even though this reduces somewhat the faith I put in earlier generations, it does not of course eliminate it, as those generations are one factor that scholars will use. But this is not infallibility. I do view the Apostles as having a unique gift of teaching infallibly, because of their extremely good knowledge of the religion, and because of their special gift of the Spirit. So here, point by point.... 1) The teaching of the Apostles is the definitive authority in Christianity. We now have that only in written form. Earlier, it was naturally possessed in a more diffusive way. For example, a close friend of Alexander Hamilton would not have needed to consult his writings to know what was his opinion on something. But 200 years later, it is only his speeches, writings -- and, yes, letters to those friends that let us know what he believed on various issues. That explains why the early church did not need the Bible as we have it -- they had the Apostles. You may now say that the church was blessed with a permanent authority of that type, but that is quite separate issue. I have found no cause to believe that and many causes not to. 2) You are correct that at the writing of any given NT book, some number of the NT books had yet to be written, and as such could not have come under the title of Scripture at that time (although Peter canonizes the body of Paul's work in II Peter -- and yes, I would feel just as happy if it had been John =)). So your point is well taken that the early Christian Scriptures were the OT. Indeed, the OT+Gospel seems to be the body of the message taught in the NT (see Acts 2), and it's too bad the church has lost that perspective. A great deal of the NT is applying OT covenant principles to the new age. 3) It was more a general acceptance than a committee decision. The Scriptures were accepted very long before two councils in the late 4th century named the canon, and even those two were not infallible by Roman Catholic standards. The canon wasn't defined in such a way as to meet RC standards of infallibility until Trent in the 16th century. Also, we do have some of the NT apocryphal books that were rejected from the canon, so they can still be reexamined if you are uncomfortable trusting early scholarship. But yes, it was by the authority of scholarship, well-intentioned, and invoking the aid of God, that gave us the canon. Not a direct revelation. 4) You'll have to be more specific -- which group of men specifically do we not know enough about to trust them? As for infallibility, my major problem (among many problems) with it is that it has nothing on which to base itself except itself. The Bible is silent on the matter (no, the Big Three verses I do find to suggest anything approaching infallibility, and they are totally silent on the matter of succession). I should also note that one thing I do feel that adds trust to the decision made is the high consistency of the books of the Bible, compared with either those books that were left out, or with later decisions of the Church. I apologize if this is wandering or badly written... it's hard to write on such an all-encompassing subject in a casual post before lunch! Love in Christ, ATN |
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