Re: Query concerning logical priority of "Sola Scriptura".

On Sun, 5 Mar 2006 12:30:30 +0200, "Stephen Korsman"
<skorsman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


"Frodo" <mark.beth@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1141511673.232363.310290@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hello Alberich,

Thanks for replying so promptly! And thanks for your help with this
one. I forwarded what you'd said and have another respone with which I
need some help again. I tried to summarise it but found it too hard, so
I hope you won't mind me quoting it verbatim below:

"With regard to any oral or unwritten traditions with which the Roman
Catholic Church (RCC) seeks to support itself, how are we to determine
their authenticity in the absence of any documentary source or sources?
We have only the bare word of the RCC. But in any case I would
conjecture that these "unwritten" traditions, since they purportedly
support the RCC, would without doubt actually *be* written somewhere,
or incorporated somehow into that church's body of literature. If this
is indeed the case, then surely we may safely have a discussion about
the validity and authenticity of these (now-written) traditions? If it
is not, then what is the criterion for my acceptance of these
traditions? Is it not a bare "credo" or blind faith in what the RCC
says?

But with regard to the seveal quotations from Scripture provided by
Alberich, we are as we were: for it is not yet disproved that, in order
to believe any of the aftorementioned quotations, we must logically
(that is, by an ineluctable progression of thought where we must not
take for granted that which is to be proved) *first* believe the
Scriptures quoted, *before* we then proceed (even if only after the
blink of an eye) to conclude that they support the RCC."

For someone living in the 21st century, it might well be logical to believe
the Bible before they conclude support for the RCC from the Bible. And
especially someone approaching the matter from a Protestant perspective.
But that's not the logical progression.

If we look at how the Bible and the authority of the Church came into
existence, we see the Church first, and then the Bible taking its place as a
witness to Christ's teaching and the Church's teaching.

In Acts, we see the Church doing a fair bit of teaching, and in the Epistles
we see those teachers write a lot of it down. But neither Acts nor the
Epistles are what gives that teaching authority. Perhaps to us today, yes,
but that is because these are our records of that teaching, and are the
primary records we use to know what their teaching was. But in an absolute
sense, the authority for that teaching doesn't derive from the Bible's
witness to it - it derives from Jesus who gave the command teach to the
Apostles. The Bible is merely a witness - an infallible witness, an
inspired witness, and authoritative in the sense of a witness. But the
progression of authority goes as follows:

Jesus --> authority of the Apostles/Church --> recorded in an inspired
witness, the Bible

NOT

Bible --> authority of the Apostles/Church

An example could be made of Jesus' resurrection. Do we believe Jesus rose
from the dead because the Bible says so?

In a sense, yes - we believe that because the Bible is an infallible,
inspired witness to what happened.

But Jesus did not rise from the dead because the Bible says so. Jesus rose
from the dead, AND the Bible records that event in its witness to his
mission. The Bible's record is not the authority by which Jesus rose from
the dead; rather, Jesus' rising from the dead is the real event that allows
the Bible to record it.

So our faith is not in a book - it's in real events, real people, that are
recorded in a book.

Similarly, the Apostles and the Church are not authoritative BECAUSE the
Bible says so - the Bible gives witness to their authority because Jesus
gave that authority to them.

So, even if our only source of accurate information today is the Bible,
which we believe to be inspired, the Bible is not the authority by which
Jesus rose from the dead, or by which the Church has authority.

In a sense, yes, we have to go to the Bible to find out a lot of these
things - because the Bible is an inspired witness to them. And we can
formulate doctrine from the Bible, not because the Bible is an authoritative
cause of doctrine, but because the Bible is an inspired witness to the
doctrine of the Apostles.

So, yes, in a way, this is blind faith in the authority of the Church. But
it's no blinder than the blind faith we would have in the authority of the
Bible. Less of a blind faith, in fact, because history - including the
history recorded in the Bible - points to the authority of the Church coming
first, then authoritative teaching, and then authoritative letters and
Gospels recording that teaching, and then an authoritative collection of
those letters by the Church.

Remember that the letters and Gospels would not be authoritative at all had
God not given the writers the authority to teach. And we would not have an
authoritative list of what the Bible contains had the Church not used its
authority to compile them all into one collection. God gave the Apostles
and the Church the inspiration and authority to teach, to write these texts,
and to compile them into one collection. But nowhere is there a teaching
that their authority would later be revoked, and replaced with the Bible.

In a sense, this is all true of Tradition as well. The authority belongs to
the Church, and its source was Jesus when he sent the Apostles to teach;
Tradition and the Bible are witnesses to that teaching - they came
afterwards. Inspired and kept pure by the Holy Spirit, yes, but still a
witness to the Holy Spirit working in the Church.

Stephen, do you actually know what Sola Scripture means as opposed to
those who believe the bible needs to be taken literally. From you
comments here you seem to be confusing them both.


--
Alan "Ferrit" Ferris

()'.'.'()
( (T) )
( ) . ( )
(")_(")
.

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