Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

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Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

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Quote:

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Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

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Oldbear83 said:

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Doc: " Five centuries later there's a straight line from Wittenberg to the Episcopal Church blessing same sex unions. You can be angry about that observation but it's not a myth and it's not a taunt. "

What you have there is a biased claim based completely on filtered opinion. I certainly do not deny that there have been false teachers and that many have fallen away, just as Jesus warned. But the error in your claim is the lie that this started with the Reformation. Accounts of proud and false teachers in the Church go all the way back to the missions of Paul. And the notion that the Roman leaders were true and faithful to Christ all through their history is a deluded fiction; the Reformation was spurred by very real sins by RCC leaders.

The key observation for both sides should be, in my opinion, that all men have sinned and we must all be wary to check our egos and put away petty sniping at other denominations, preferring to let iron sharpen iron and support one another where someone does right, and to correct privately where error is found, but never in the arrogance of imagining our opinion is perfect.

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Yes, there were false teachers in Paul's day. The difference? The Church had a structure to identify, condemn, and exclude them. Councils. Bishops in succession. Binding authority. That's why those heresies didn't produce 40,000 denominations. Go read Acts, there's a literal council in scripture.

Again I'm not Roman Catholic brother. You've got to understand that RC started/established in the 1000s.
I never claimed it started with the reformation. We agree. It started in 1054, when the Roman Church broke communion with the apostolic consensus. It broke away from Orthodoxy. Luther exposed the rot that Rome's unaccountable authority had produced.

The Reformers didn't escape Rome's theological framework. They inherited it wholesale and intensified it. They'd rejected Rome's answers but never questioned Rome's questions. So the Reformation wasn't a recovery of ancient Christianity. It was a family dispute between two branches of a tradition that had already departed from the apostolic theological framework centuries earlier.

If there is one truth, one faith once delivered to the saints, then there must be a reliable mechanism for identifying it. A standard that actually produces unity, not just demands it. It's NOT ok for everyone to not be on the same page: that's how you end up with woke churches, Mormons, prosperity gospel, charismatics and who know what crazy branches will develop over the next several hundred years.

We lead people astray on this ecumenical model. It's sinful.

Find a mirror: Your own hands, Orthodox, are also dirty.

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Yes, the apostles appointed elders and overseers. Nobody disputes that. But that is not the same thing as proving an unbroken chain of bishops with absolute doctrinal authority over the entire Church. There's no clear New Testament model of a single ruling bishop over each city in the way later Orthodoxy and Catholicism claim.

As for Ignatius, first, his writings are not the infallible word of God. Second, all that his writings show are that by the early 2nd century, a structure was developing, not that Christ commanded that exact structure or made it infallible. Early church practice is not divine mandate. The Church grew and organized itself over time; that doesn't make every later development binding on all Christians forever.

As for the Eucharist: saying it "requires" a bishop isn't taught anywhere in Scripture. Paul corrects the Corinthians on the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 and never once says, "You lack a valid bishop, therefore your Eucharist is invalid." Instead, he focuses on right belief and right conduct.

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There's no clear NT model of a congregational vote, a senior pastor with a board of deacons, or a General Assembly of presbyteries either…but you hold to that model.

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Unlike you, I'm not claiming my church structure is the only valid, divinely mandated model. You are. You're the poster claiming Scripture establishes a specific, binding structure (a monarchical bishop who determines sacramental validity). And of course, your argument only works if you can show that your specific structure is clearly required by Scripture itself, not just that structure in general exists. And you've failed to make that showing.

Will respond to the rest later.

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On whose authority are we required to ONLY rely on scripture? That's not written down in scripture. The seat of Moses was treated as a real legitimate authority recognized by Christ...and its not found or mentioned anywhere in the OT. By Jesus' own standard, God establishes binding, authoritative, oral and institutional structures to govern His people that bypass your modern requirement of text only proof.

The Gospels and Epistles were never intended to be an exhaustive, standalone manual for church administration. They were written to existing communities that already had established leadership, oral traditions, and liturgical practices.

Do you believe that the Holy Spirit can't protects the repository of faith in spite of the men? You seem to think that a visible Church isn't possible because of fallible men.If a visible, divinely mandated structure is invalid the moment the men inside it act sinfully, foolishly, or fallibly, then Christ's own earthly ministry was a failure. Did Judas's betrayal mean the group of the Twelve lost its divine mandate? Absolutely not.

If human fallibility entirely invalidates an institutional process, then the Protestant has no basis upon which to trust the Bible. To believe that the Holy Spirit could miraculously guide fallible men to write and canonize an infallible book, but is somehow utterly incapable of guiding fallible men to maintain a continuous, visible Church, is a massive logical contradiction.

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You're shifting the burden of proof. I'm not denying that authority, tradition, or structure exist, or arguing its all invalid. I'm questioning your claim that your specific model (a monarchical bishop with binding sacramental authority) is divinely mandated. That's what you haven't demonstrated.

As for "Scripture alone," again, it is undisputed that Scripture is uniquely God-breathed, while traditions are tested against it (Mark 7). You're asking me to grant infallible authority to later institutions, and that's the very point in dispute. Appealing to apostolic-era structures doesn't help your position, either. While the apostles had unique, foundational authority, you still haven't shown that this authority continues in an unbroken, infallible institutional form.

God infallibly inspires Scripture. He doesn't guaranty infallibility to all later church leadership. You're conflating revelation with administration. So again, you haven't shown that your specific structure is divinely required or infallibly preserved, and that's the claim you need to prove.

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You're acting like your position is the default and I have to prove mine, but that's not how this works. The idea that every individual believer interprets Scripture privately with no binding authority above them is itself a very specific claim…and a pretty recent one historically. Why does that get a free pass?

Monarchical bishops aren't a "later institution." Ignatius of Antioch is writing around 107 AD, before anyone had even agreed on what books belonged in the NT, saying no valid Eucharist without the bishop, no church without the bishop.

On Mark 7, Jesus is rebuking the Pharisees for using tradition to override God's actual commandment. But the Pharisees weren't in legitimate succession from anything, they were innovators using tradition as a shield against the living authority standing right in front of them. That passage has nothing to do with apostolic succession.

Where does Scripture say apostolic authority terminates? 2 Timothy 2:2 is literally a four-generation succession chain in one verse. Paul tells Titus to appoint elders city by city. This structure isn't something we're reading into the text.

I'm not claiming every bishop is personally infallible. The claim is that Christ promised the Spirit would guide the Church into all truth, and he said that to the apostles as a body, not to you alone with your Bible. You've set up your own epistemology as the neutral starting point. I'm not granting that.

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You're not responding to what I'm actually saying. I'm not arguing that every person just sits alone with a Bible and answers to nobody. What I'm saying is simple: Scripture is the final authority, and the Church is accountable to it, not above it. There's a big difference between chaos and having a highest standard, and you're treating those like they're the same thing when they're not.

You say my view gets a free pass, but it doesn't. It stands or falls on whether it lines up with what the apostles actually taught. But your claim goes further, you're not just saying the Church has authority, you're saying a specific structure (bishops in an unbroken line) has binding authority over all Christians everywhere. That's a much bigger claim, and it needs very clear proof.

Appealing to Ignatius doesn't get you there. All he shows is what the Church looked like around 100 AD. That doesn't prove that this exact structure was commanded by Christ or required for all time. Just because something shows up early doesn't mean it was meant to be universal and binding. And once you lean on later writers to define what the Church must be, you've already stepped beyond Scripture as the final standard -that's the very issue we're debating.

Same problem with 2 Timothy 2:2. Yes, teaching gets passed on, that's obvious. But that's not the same thing as proving a chain of offices with guaranteed authority over the whole Church. The verse is about preserving the message, not setting up an institution that controls everything.

When you bring up the Spirit guiding the Church, you're taking a promise made to the apostles and stretching it into a guarantee about a specific institution, which you then identify as your tradition. That step isn't stated in the text; it's something you're adding. And history itself shows the Church hasn't always been neat and unified in the way your claim requires.

So this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture. You're saying it rests in a later institution that claims to preserve that message. Those aren't the same - and you still haven't shown from Scripture itself that your system is binding on everyone.

Sam Lowry said:

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Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

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Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

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Quote:

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Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

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And??

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

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Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

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And??

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And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

Sam Lowry said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

---

QFP

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

---

QFP

---

Your Quintessential Faux Pas? Couldn't agree more.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

---

QFP

---

Your Quintessential Faux Pas? Couldn't agree more.

---

Just wanted your post on the record, since you were insisting that Newman conceded the truth of the doctrine.

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

---

QFP

---

Your Quintessential Faux Pas? Couldn't agree more.

---

Just wanted your post on the record, since you were insisting that Newman conceded the truth of the doctrine.

---

You still don't see your error, huh? Not surprised.

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Yes, the apostles appointed elders and overseers. Nobody disputes that. But that is not the same thing as proving an unbroken chain of bishops with absolute doctrinal authority over the entire Church. There's no clear New Testament model of a single ruling bishop over each city in the way later Orthodoxy and Catholicism claim.

As for Ignatius, first, his writings are not the infallible word of God. Second, all that his writings show are that by the early 2nd century, a structure was developing, not that Christ commanded that exact structure or made it infallible. Early church practice is not divine mandate. The Church grew and organized itself over time; that doesn't make every later development binding on all Christians forever.

As for the Eucharist: saying it "requires" a bishop isn't taught anywhere in Scripture. Paul corrects the Corinthians on the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 and never once says, "You lack a valid bishop, therefore your Eucharist is invalid." Instead, he focuses on right belief and right conduct.

---

There's no clear NT model of a congregational vote, a senior pastor with a board of deacons, or a General Assembly of presbyteries either…but you hold to that model.

---

Unlike you, I'm not claiming my church structure is the only valid, divinely mandated model. You are. You're the poster claiming Scripture establishes a specific, binding structure (a monarchical bishop who determines sacramental validity). And of course, your argument only works if you can show that your specific structure is clearly required by Scripture itself, not just that structure in general exists. And you've failed to make that showing.

Will respond to the rest later.

---

On whose authority are we required to ONLY rely on scripture? That's not written down in scripture. The seat of Moses was treated as a real legitimate authority recognized by Christ...and its not found or mentioned anywhere in the OT. By Jesus' own standard, God establishes binding, authoritative, oral and institutional structures to govern His people that bypass your modern requirement of text only proof.

The Gospels and Epistles were never intended to be an exhaustive, standalone manual for church administration. They were written to existing communities that already had established leadership, oral traditions, and liturgical practices.

Do you believe that the Holy Spirit can't protects the repository of faith in spite of the men? You seem to think that a visible Church isn't possible because of fallible men.If a visible, divinely mandated structure is invalid the moment the men inside it act sinfully, foolishly, or fallibly, then Christ's own earthly ministry was a failure. Did Judas's betrayal mean the group of the Twelve lost its divine mandate? Absolutely not.

If human fallibility entirely invalidates an institutional process, then the Protestant has no basis upon which to trust the Bible. To believe that the Holy Spirit could miraculously guide fallible men to write and canonize an infallible book, but is somehow utterly incapable of guiding fallible men to maintain a continuous, visible Church, is a massive logical contradiction.

---

You're shifting the burden of proof. I'm not denying that authority, tradition, or structure exist, or arguing its all invalid. I'm questioning your claim that your specific model (a monarchical bishop with binding sacramental authority) is divinely mandated. That's what you haven't demonstrated.

As for "Scripture alone," again, it is undisputed that Scripture is uniquely God-breathed, while traditions are tested against it (Mark 7). You're asking me to grant infallible authority to later institutions, and that's the very point in dispute. Appealing to apostolic-era structures doesn't help your position, either. While the apostles had unique, foundational authority, you still haven't shown that this authority continues in an unbroken, infallible institutional form.

God infallibly inspires Scripture. He doesn't guaranty infallibility to all later church leadership. You're conflating revelation with administration. So again, you haven't shown that your specific structure is divinely required or infallibly preserved, and that's the claim you need to prove.

---

You're acting like your position is the default and I have to prove mine, but that's not how this works. The idea that every individual believer interprets Scripture privately with no binding authority above them is itself a very specific claim…and a pretty recent one historically. Why does that get a free pass?

Monarchical bishops aren't a "later institution." Ignatius of Antioch is writing around 107 AD, before anyone had even agreed on what books belonged in the NT, saying no valid Eucharist without the bishop, no church without the bishop.

On Mark 7, Jesus is rebuking the Pharisees for using tradition to override God's actual commandment. But the Pharisees weren't in legitimate succession from anything, they were innovators using tradition as a shield against the living authority standing right in front of them. That passage has nothing to do with apostolic succession.

Where does Scripture say apostolic authority terminates? 2 Timothy 2:2 is literally a four-generation succession chain in one verse. Paul tells Titus to appoint elders city by city. This structure isn't something we're reading into the text.

I'm not claiming every bishop is personally infallible. The claim is that Christ promised the Spirit would guide the Church into all truth, and he said that to the apostles as a body, not to you alone with your Bible. You've set up your own epistemology as the neutral starting point. I'm not granting that.

---

You're not responding to what I'm actually saying. I'm not arguing that every person just sits alone with a Bible and answers to nobody. What I'm saying is simple: Scripture is the final authority, and the Church is accountable to it, not above it. There's a big difference between chaos and having a highest standard, and you're treating those like they're the same thing when they're not.

You say my view gets a free pass, but it doesn't. It stands or falls on whether it lines up with what the apostles actually taught. But your claim goes further, you're not just saying the Church has authority, you're saying a specific structure (bishops in an unbroken line) has binding authority over all Christians everywhere. That's a much bigger claim, and it needs very clear proof.

Appealing to Ignatius doesn't get you there. All he shows is what the Church looked like around 100 AD. That doesn't prove that this exact structure was commanded by Christ or required for all time. Just because something shows up early doesn't mean it was meant to be universal and binding. And once you lean on later writers to define what the Church must be, you've already stepped beyond Scripture as the final standard -that's the very issue we're debating.

Same problem with 2 Timothy 2:2. Yes, teaching gets passed on, that's obvious. But that's not the same thing as proving a chain of offices with guaranteed authority over the whole Church. The verse is about preserving the message, not setting up an institution that controls everything.

When you bring up the Spirit guiding the Church, you're taking a promise made to the apostles and stretching it into a guarantee about a specific institution, which you then identify as your tradition. That step isn't stated in the text; it's something you're adding. And history itself shows the Church hasn't always been neat and unified in the way your claim requires.

So this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture. You're saying it rests in a later institution that claims to preserve that message. Those aren't the same - and you still haven't shown from Scripture itself that your system is binding on everyone.

---

You're making a category error. A major one. You're claiming that you have access to authority because you can read the apostolic message correctly. That means the functional authority is yourself…not scripture.

You said: " this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture". Do you understand that this is illogical? You cannot take away any understanding of scripture without applying your own interpretative authority. The authority CANNOT stop at scripture. There's no way to argue around this. Authority doesn't reside in a text. It resides in a person or institution that can bind.

You have never once practiced sola scriptura in your life. It's impossible to practice. Don't get it twisted thinking this is tradition vs scripture. You CANNOT read scripture and take away an understanding without applying an authority.

When a Jehovah's Witness shows up at your door with a Bible and tells you Jesus is a created being, you don't say "well, you're reading Scripture and so am I, so I guess we're equally valid." You say they're wrong. But wrong by what standard? Not Scripture alone, because they have Scripture too and they're reading it. You're appealing, whether you admit it or not, to the received interpretation of the Church, to the councils that defined Trinitarian orthodoxy, to Nicaea, to the Cappadocian Fathers, to a tradition of reading.

Every Protestant, without exception, practices a de facto final authority that is not Scripture alone. It is their tradition's reading of Scripture. The only difference between them and the Orthodox is that the Orthodox are honest about it.

Also, you said I haven't shown from Scripture that an authoritative structure is binding on everyone. Acts 15 shows a council of identified office-holders issuing a decree claimed to be guided by the Holy Spirit, delivered to all churches, and expected to be obeyed universally. That is Orthodox ecclesiology in the New Testament.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

---

Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

---

QFP

---

Your Quintessential Faux Pas? Couldn't agree more.

---

Just wanted your post on the record, since you were insisting that Newman conceded the truth of the doctrine.

---

You still don't see your error, huh? Not surprised.

---

Help me wrap this up, because I'm about exhausted. Were you not the one claiming that Newman acknowledged sola scriptura?

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Newman on sola scriptura:

Quote:

---

Now, my dear brethren, consider, are not these two states or acts of mind quite distinct from each other; to believe simply what a living authority tells you, and to take a book such as Scripture, and to use it as you please, to master it, that is, to make yourself the master of it, to interpret it for yourself, and to admit just what you choose to see in it, and nothing more? Are not these two procedures distinct in this, that in the former you submit, in the latter you judge? At this moment I am not asking you which is the better, I am not asking whether this or that is practicable now, but are they not two ways of taking up a doctrine, and not one? is not submission quite contrary to judging? Now, is it not certain that faith in the time of the Apostles consisted in submitting? and is it not certain that it did not consist in judging for one's self. It is in vain to say that the man who judges from the Apostle's writings, does submit to those writings in the first instance, and therefore has faith in them; else why should he refer to them at all? There is, I repeat, an essential difference between the act of submitting to a living oracle, and to his written words; in the former case there is no appeal from the speaker, in the latter the final decision remains with the reader.

I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt or change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God.

---

Quote:

---

Let them consider, that if they can criticize history, the facts of history certainly can retort upon them. It might, I grant, be clearer on this great subject than it is. This is no great concession. History is not a creed or a catechism, it gives lessons rather than rules; still no one can mistake its general teaching in this matter, whether he accept it or stumble at it. Bold outlines and broad masses of colour rise out of the records of the past. They may be dim, they may be incomplete; but they are definite. And this one thing at least is certain; whatever history teaches, whatever it omits, whatever it exaggerates or extenuates, whatever it says and unsays, at least the Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth, it is this.

And Protestantism has ever felt it so. I do not mean that every writer on the Protestant side has felt it; for it was the fashion at first, at least as a rhetorical argument against Rome, to appeal to past ages, or to some of them; but Protestantism, as a whole, feels it, and has felt it. This is shown in the determination already referred to of dispensing with historical Christianity altogether, and of forming a Christianity from the Bible alone: men never would have put it aside, unless they had despaired of it. It is shown by the long neglect of ecclesiastical history in England, which prevails even in the English Church. Our popular religion scarcely recognizes the fact of the twelve long ages which lie between the Councils of Nicaea and Trent, except as affording one or two passages to illustrate its wild interpretations of certain prophesies of St. Paul and St. John. It is melancholy to say it, but the chief, perhaps the only English writer who has any claim to be considered an ecclesiastical historian, is the unbeliever Gibbon. To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant.

---

---

And??

---

And Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura.

I know...I know. I don't really understand sola scriptura because it's all about the theoretical sufficiency of Scripture and you acknowledge that it can be misinterpreted. You're still missing the point.

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Newman didn't believe in sola scriptura, not shocking.

And?

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QFP

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Your Quintessential Faux Pas? Couldn't agree more.

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Just wanted your post on the record, since you were insisting that Newman conceded the truth of the doctrine.

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You still don't see your error, huh? Not surprised.

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Help me wrap this up, because I'm about exhausted. Were you not the one claiming that Newman acknowledged sola scriptura?

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Do you truly think that I had claimed that Newman himself acknowledged the truth of sola scriptura? PLEASE go back and read the excerpt that I gave and what I was arguing.

This is proof that your comprehension on these matters is lacking, just like in the other thread. Maybe you need to think twice about who it really is who doesn't know what they're talking about.

Mm-hm.

Sam Lowry said:

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Mm-hm.

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Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

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Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Yes, the apostles appointed elders and overseers. Nobody disputes that. But that is not the same thing as proving an unbroken chain of bishops with absolute doctrinal authority over the entire Church. There's no clear New Testament model of a single ruling bishop over each city in the way later Orthodoxy and Catholicism claim.

As for Ignatius, first, his writings are not the infallible word of God. Second, all that his writings show are that by the early 2nd century, a structure was developing, not that Christ commanded that exact structure or made it infallible. Early church practice is not divine mandate. The Church grew and organized itself over time; that doesn't make every later development binding on all Christians forever.

As for the Eucharist: saying it "requires" a bishop isn't taught anywhere in Scripture. Paul corrects the Corinthians on the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 and never once says, "You lack a valid bishop, therefore your Eucharist is invalid." Instead, he focuses on right belief and right conduct.

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There's no clear NT model of a congregational vote, a senior pastor with a board of deacons, or a General Assembly of presbyteries either…but you hold to that model.

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Unlike you, I'm not claiming my church structure is the only valid, divinely mandated model. You are. You're the poster claiming Scripture establishes a specific, binding structure (a monarchical bishop who determines sacramental validity). And of course, your argument only works if you can show that your specific structure is clearly required by Scripture itself, not just that structure in general exists. And you've failed to make that showing.

Will respond to the rest later.

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On whose authority are we required to ONLY rely on scripture? That's not written down in scripture. The seat of Moses was treated as a real legitimate authority recognized by Christ...and its not found or mentioned anywhere in the OT. By Jesus' own standard, God establishes binding, authoritative, oral and institutional structures to govern His people that bypass your modern requirement of text only proof.

The Gospels and Epistles were never intended to be an exhaustive, standalone manual for church administration. They were written to existing communities that already had established leadership, oral traditions, and liturgical practices.

Do you believe that the Holy Spirit can't protects the repository of faith in spite of the men? You seem to think that a visible Church isn't possible because of fallible men.If a visible, divinely mandated structure is invalid the moment the men inside it act sinfully, foolishly, or fallibly, then Christ's own earthly ministry was a failure. Did Judas's betrayal mean the group of the Twelve lost its divine mandate? Absolutely not.

If human fallibility entirely invalidates an institutional process, then the Protestant has no basis upon which to trust the Bible. To believe that the Holy Spirit could miraculously guide fallible men to write and canonize an infallible book, but is somehow utterly incapable of guiding fallible men to maintain a continuous, visible Church, is a massive logical contradiction.

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You're shifting the burden of proof. I'm not denying that authority, tradition, or structure exist, or arguing its all invalid. I'm questioning your claim that your specific model (a monarchical bishop with binding sacramental authority) is divinely mandated. That's what you haven't demonstrated.

As for "Scripture alone," again, it is undisputed that Scripture is uniquely God-breathed, while traditions are tested against it (Mark 7). You're asking me to grant infallible authority to later institutions, and that's the very point in dispute. Appealing to apostolic-era structures doesn't help your position, either. While the apostles had unique, foundational authority, you still haven't shown that this authority continues in an unbroken, infallible institutional form.

God infallibly inspires Scripture. He doesn't guaranty infallibility to all later church leadership. You're conflating revelation with administration. So again, you haven't shown that your specific structure is divinely required or infallibly preserved, and that's the claim you need to prove.

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You're acting like your position is the default and I have to prove mine, but that's not how this works. The idea that every individual believer interprets Scripture privately with no binding authority above them is itself a very specific claim…and a pretty recent one historically. Why does that get a free pass?

Monarchical bishops aren't a "later institution." Ignatius of Antioch is writing around 107 AD, before anyone had even agreed on what books belonged in the NT, saying no valid Eucharist without the bishop, no church without the bishop.

On Mark 7, Jesus is rebuking the Pharisees for using tradition to override God's actual commandment. But the Pharisees weren't in legitimate succession from anything, they were innovators using tradition as a shield against the living authority standing right in front of them. That passage has nothing to do with apostolic succession.

Where does Scripture say apostolic authority terminates? 2 Timothy 2:2 is literally a four-generation succession chain in one verse. Paul tells Titus to appoint elders city by city. This structure isn't something we're reading into the text.

I'm not claiming every bishop is personally infallible. The claim is that Christ promised the Spirit would guide the Church into all truth, and he said that to the apostles as a body, not to you alone with your Bible. You've set up your own epistemology as the neutral starting point. I'm not granting that.

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You're not responding to what I'm actually saying. I'm not arguing that every person just sits alone with a Bible and answers to nobody. What I'm saying is simple: Scripture is the final authority, and the Church is accountable to it, not above it. There's a big difference between chaos and having a highest standard, and you're treating those like they're the same thing when they're not.

You say my view gets a free pass, but it doesn't. It stands or falls on whether it lines up with what the apostles actually taught. But your claim goes further, you're not just saying the Church has authority, you're saying a specific structure (bishops in an unbroken line) has binding authority over all Christians everywhere. That's a much bigger claim, and it needs very clear proof.

Appealing to Ignatius doesn't get you there. All he shows is what the Church looked like around 100 AD. That doesn't prove that this exact structure was commanded by Christ or required for all time. Just because something shows up early doesn't mean it was meant to be universal and binding. And once you lean on later writers to define what the Church must be, you've already stepped beyond Scripture as the final standard -that's the very issue we're debating.

Same problem with 2 Timothy 2:2. Yes, teaching gets passed on, that's obvious. But that's not the same thing as proving a chain of offices with guaranteed authority over the whole Church. The verse is about preserving the message, not setting up an institution that controls everything.

When you bring up the Spirit guiding the Church, you're taking a promise made to the apostles and stretching it into a guarantee about a specific institution, which you then identify as your tradition. That step isn't stated in the text; it's something you're adding. And history itself shows the Church hasn't always been neat and unified in the way your claim requires.

So this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture. You're saying it rests in a later institution that claims to preserve that message. Those aren't the same - and you still haven't shown from Scripture itself that your system is binding on everyone.

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You're making a category error. A major one. You're claiming that you have access to authority because you can read the apostolic message correctly. That means the functional authority is yourself…not scripture.

You said: " this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture". Do you understand that this is illogical? You cannot take away any understanding of scripture without applying your own interpretative authority. The authority CANNOT stop at scripture. There's no way to argue around this. Authority doesn't reside in a text. It resides in a person or institution that can bind.

You have never once practiced sola scriptura in your life. It's impossible to practice. Don't get it twisted thinking this is tradition vs scripture. You CANNOT read scripture and take away an understanding without applying an authority.

When a Jehovah's Witness shows up at your door with a Bible and tells you Jesus is a created being, you don't say "well, you're reading Scripture and so am I, so I guess we're equally valid." You say they're wrong. But wrong by what standard? Not Scripture alone, because they have Scripture too and they're reading it. You're appealing, whether you admit it or not, to the received interpretation of the Church, to the councils that defined Trinitarian orthodoxy, to Nicaea, to the Cappadocian Fathers, to a tradition of reading.

Every Protestant, without exception, practices a de facto final authority that is not Scripture alone. It is their tradition's reading of Scripture. The only difference between them and the Orthodox is that the Orthodox are honest about it.

Also, you said I haven't shown from Scripture that an authoritative structure is binding on everyone. Acts 15 shows a council of identified office-holders issuing a decree claimed to be guided by the Holy Spirit, delivered to all churches, and expected to be obeyed universally. That is Orthodox ecclesiology in the New Testament.

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Yes, everyone has to interpret Scripture. That's unavoidable. But just because I interpret it doesn't mean I become the authority. It just means I'm trying (fallibly) to understand what the actual authority (Scripture) says. Those aren't the same thing.

You're also assuming that authority has to be in a person or institution that can issue binding rulings. But there's no scriptural support for the idea that is required (as repeatedly pointed out). The Bible presents God's written word itself as binding because it comes from Him, not because an institution stands over it.

Regarding the Jehovah's Witness example: the issue isn't "we both have Bibles so we're equally right." The issue is which interpretation actually fits what the Bible teaches as a whole. Using context, consistency, and reasoning doesn't mean I'm secretly relying on some infallible institution. It just means I'm trying to read the text correctly.

On tradition: yes, Protestants respect things like the Council of Nicaea, but that council got its authority by correctly explaining Scripture, not by being above it. If councils were the ultimate authority, then you wouldn't even need Scripture.

As we've already discussed, Acts 15 doesn't settle this either. That council had the apostles themselves there - people with unique, God-given authority. That's not something that continues forever. You can't just assume later church structures have that same level of authority.

At the end of the day, saying "sola scriptura is impossible because everyone interprets" is a bit ridiculous. It's like saying objective truth doesn't exist because people disagree. The real question is simple: Is anything besides Scripture infallible? That's where we disagree.

Sam Lowry said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

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Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Yes, the apostles appointed elders and overseers. Nobody disputes that. But that is not the same thing as proving an unbroken chain of bishops with absolute doctrinal authority over the entire Church. There's no clear New Testament model of a single ruling bishop over each city in the way later Orthodoxy and Catholicism claim.

As for Ignatius, first, his writings are not the infallible word of God. Second, all that his writings show are that by the early 2nd century, a structure was developing, not that Christ commanded that exact structure or made it infallible. Early church practice is not divine mandate. The Church grew and organized itself over time; that doesn't make every later development binding on all Christians forever.

As for the Eucharist: saying it "requires" a bishop isn't taught anywhere in Scripture. Paul corrects the Corinthians on the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 and never once says, "You lack a valid bishop, therefore your Eucharist is invalid." Instead, he focuses on right belief and right conduct.

---

There's no clear NT model of a congregational vote, a senior pastor with a board of deacons, or a General Assembly of presbyteries either…but you hold to that model.

---

Unlike you, I'm not claiming my church structure is the only valid, divinely mandated model. You are. You're the poster claiming Scripture establishes a specific, binding structure (a monarchical bishop who determines sacramental validity). And of course, your argument only works if you can show that your specific structure is clearly required by Scripture itself, not just that structure in general exists. And you've failed to make that showing.

Will respond to the rest later.

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On whose authority are we required to ONLY rely on scripture? That's not written down in scripture. The seat of Moses was treated as a real legitimate authority recognized by Christ...and its not found or mentioned anywhere in the OT. By Jesus' own standard, God establishes binding, authoritative, oral and institutional structures to govern His people that bypass your modern requirement of text only proof.

The Gospels and Epistles were never intended to be an exhaustive, standalone manual for church administration. They were written to existing communities that already had established leadership, oral traditions, and liturgical practices.

Do you believe that the Holy Spirit can't protects the repository of faith in spite of the men? You seem to think that a visible Church isn't possible because of fallible men.If a visible, divinely mandated structure is invalid the moment the men inside it act sinfully, foolishly, or fallibly, then Christ's own earthly ministry was a failure. Did Judas's betrayal mean the group of the Twelve lost its divine mandate? Absolutely not.

If human fallibility entirely invalidates an institutional process, then the Protestant has no basis upon which to trust the Bible. To believe that the Holy Spirit could miraculously guide fallible men to write and canonize an infallible book, but is somehow utterly incapable of guiding fallible men to maintain a continuous, visible Church, is a massive logical contradiction.

---

You're shifting the burden of proof. I'm not denying that authority, tradition, or structure exist, or arguing its all invalid. I'm questioning your claim that your specific model (a monarchical bishop with binding sacramental authority) is divinely mandated. That's what you haven't demonstrated.

As for "Scripture alone," again, it is undisputed that Scripture is uniquely God-breathed, while traditions are tested against it (Mark 7). You're asking me to grant infallible authority to later institutions, and that's the very point in dispute. Appealing to apostolic-era structures doesn't help your position, either. While the apostles had unique, foundational authority, you still haven't shown that this authority continues in an unbroken, infallible institutional form.

God infallibly inspires Scripture. He doesn't guaranty infallibility to all later church leadership. You're conflating revelation with administration. So again, you haven't shown that your specific structure is divinely required or infallibly preserved, and that's the claim you need to prove.

---

You're acting like your position is the default and I have to prove mine, but that's not how this works. The idea that every individual believer interprets Scripture privately with no binding authority above them is itself a very specific claim…and a pretty recent one historically. Why does that get a free pass?

Monarchical bishops aren't a "later institution." Ignatius of Antioch is writing around 107 AD, before anyone had even agreed on what books belonged in the NT, saying no valid Eucharist without the bishop, no church without the bishop.

On Mark 7, Jesus is rebuking the Pharisees for using tradition to override God's actual commandment. But the Pharisees weren't in legitimate succession from anything, they were innovators using tradition as a shield against the living authority standing right in front of them. That passage has nothing to do with apostolic succession.

Where does Scripture say apostolic authority terminates? 2 Timothy 2:2 is literally a four-generation succession chain in one verse. Paul tells Titus to appoint elders city by city. This structure isn't something we're reading into the text.

I'm not claiming every bishop is personally infallible. The claim is that Christ promised the Spirit would guide the Church into all truth, and he said that to the apostles as a body, not to you alone with your Bible. You've set up your own epistemology as the neutral starting point. I'm not granting that.

---

You're not responding to what I'm actually saying. I'm not arguing that every person just sits alone with a Bible and answers to nobody. What I'm saying is simple: Scripture is the final authority, and the Church is accountable to it, not above it. There's a big difference between chaos and having a highest standard, and you're treating those like they're the same thing when they're not.

You say my view gets a free pass, but it doesn't. It stands or falls on whether it lines up with what the apostles actually taught. But your claim goes further, you're not just saying the Church has authority, you're saying a specific structure (bishops in an unbroken line) has binding authority over all Christians everywhere. That's a much bigger claim, and it needs very clear proof.

Appealing to Ignatius doesn't get you there. All he shows is what the Church looked like around 100 AD. That doesn't prove that this exact structure was commanded by Christ or required for all time. Just because something shows up early doesn't mean it was meant to be universal and binding. And once you lean on later writers to define what the Church must be, you've already stepped beyond Scripture as the final standard -that's the very issue we're debating.

Same problem with 2 Timothy 2:2. Yes, teaching gets passed on, that's obvious. But that's not the same thing as proving a chain of offices with guaranteed authority over the whole Church. The verse is about preserving the message, not setting up an institution that controls everything.

When you bring up the Spirit guiding the Church, you're taking a promise made to the apostles and stretching it into a guarantee about a specific institution, which you then identify as your tradition. That step isn't stated in the text; it's something you're adding. And history itself shows the Church hasn't always been neat and unified in the way your claim requires.

So this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture. You're saying it rests in a later institution that claims to preserve that message. Those aren't the same - and you still haven't shown from Scripture itself that your system is binding on everyone.

---

You're making a category error. A major one. You're claiming that you have access to authority because you can read the apostolic message correctly. That means the functional authority is yourself…not scripture.

You said: " this isn't about rejecting authority. It's about where that authority actually comes from. I'm saying it rests in the apostolic message we have in Scripture". Do you understand that this is illogical? You cannot take away any understanding of scripture without applying your own interpretative authority. The authority CANNOT stop at scripture. There's no way to argue around this. Authority doesn't reside in a text. It resides in a person or institution that can bind.

You have never once practiced sola scriptura in your life. It's impossible to practice. Don't get it twisted thinking this is tradition vs scripture. You CANNOT read scripture and take away an understanding without applying an authority.

When a Jehovah's Witness shows up at your door with a Bible and tells you Jesus is a created being, you don't say "well, you're reading Scripture and so am I, so I guess we're equally valid." You say they're wrong. But wrong by what standard? Not Scripture alone, because they have Scripture too and they're reading it. You're appealing, whether you admit it or not, to the received interpretation of the Church, to the councils that defined Trinitarian orthodoxy, to Nicaea, to the Cappadocian Fathers, to a tradition of reading.

Every Protestant, without exception, practices a de facto final authority that is not Scripture alone. It is their tradition's reading of Scripture. The only difference between them and the Orthodox is that the Orthodox are honest about it.

Also, you said I haven't shown from Scripture that an authoritative structure is binding on everyone. Acts 15 shows a council of identified office-holders issuing a decree claimed to be guided by the Holy Spirit, delivered to all churches, and expected to be obeyed universally. That is Orthodox ecclesiology in the New Testament.

---

Yes, everyone has to interpret Scripture. That's unavoidable. But just because I interpret it doesn't mean I become the authority. It just means I'm trying (fallibly) to understand what the actual authority (Scripture) says. Those aren't the same thing.

You're also assuming that authority has to be in a person or institution that can issue binding rulings. But there's no scriptural support for the idea that is required (as repeatedly pointed out). The Bible presents God's written word itself as binding because it comes from Him, not because an institution stands over it.

Regarding the Jehovah's Witness example: the issue isn't "we both have Bibles so we're equally right." The issue is which interpretation actually fits what the Bible teaches as a whole. Using context, consistency, and reasoning doesn't mean I'm secretly relying on some infallible institution. It just means I'm trying to read the text correctly.

On tradition: yes, Protestants respect things like the Council of Nicaea, but that council got its authority by correctly explaining Scripture, not by being above it. If councils were the ultimate authority, then you wouldn't even need Scripture.

As we've already discussed, Acts 15 doesn't settle this either. That council had the apostles themselves there - people with unique, God-given authority. That's not something that continues forever. You can't just assume later church structures have that same level of authority.

At the end of the day, saying "sola scriptura is impossible because everyone interprets" is a bit ridiculous. It's like saying objective truth doesn't exist because people disagree. The real question is simple: Is anything besides Scripture infallible? That's where we disagree.

---

Yes, you're fallibly trying to understand Scripture. But when you finish interpreting and reach a conclusion, what happens? You act on that conclusion. You reject contrary conclusions. You call other readings wrong. You structure your theology around your reading. That conclusion is functionally authoritative for you regardless of what you call it.

Scripture's authority derives from God. Nobody disputes that. But you've confused the source of authority with its functioning exercise again. God's authority is ultimate. That doesn't tell you how it reaches you reliably, how disputes get resolved, or how you know your interpretation tracks what God actually meant rather than what you brought to the text. The divine origin of Scripture doesn't solve the interpretation problem.

How do you know Nicaea correctly explained Scripture? You read Nicaea's conclusions and compared them to your reading of Scripture and they matched. Which means your reading of Scripture is the standard by which you're validating Nicaea. But your reading of Scripture was formed by Nicaea. You learned Trinitarian categories from the tradition Nicaea established.
the Arians also thought they were correctly explaining Scripture. They had verses. They had arguments. They had bishops. The council didn't win because its exegesis was self-evidently superior on purely textual grounds. It won because it had the authority to issue a binding definition and the Church received it as such. If councils only have derivative authority from correct exegesis, then every council is permanently open to challenge by anyone who thinks their exegesis is better. Which is exactly what happened after every council. And exactly what the Reformation was.

You're reading an expiration date into Acts 15 that the text itself does not contain. Where does Acts 15 say this council structure was temporary? Where does any New Testament text say "this mechanism for binding the whole Church expires when the last apostle dies"? You're importing that limitation from outside Scripture, which means you're using a non scriptural tradition to limit what Scripture plainly describes.

Also, the elders at Acts 15 were not apostles. The text says apostles and elders. The elders had no unique God-given apostolic authority. They were office-holders in the Church's structure. Their presence in the council and their participation in the binding decree means the authority wasn't exclusively apostolic in the unique sense

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

---

Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

---

Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

---

So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

---

Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

---

So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

---

Man, you are COMPLETELY confused. You really have no idea what you're talking about. It's putting everything into perspective.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

---

Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

---

So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

---

Man, you are COMPLETELY confused.

---

I don't know who wouldn't be at this point. Anyway, Newman emphatically doesn't support your position(s).

Next topic: is the pope Catholic?

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

Mm-hm.

---

Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

---

Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

Quote:

---

Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

---

---

Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

---

Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

---

And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

---

Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

---

What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

---

My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

---

So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

---

Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

---

Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

---

So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

---

Man, you are COMPLETELY confused.

---

I don't know who wouldn't be at this point. Anyway, Newman emphatically doesn't support your position.

Next topic: is the pope Catholic?

---

Seriously - if you're just trolling and BS'ing your way through yet another debate, then I sincerely ask, again - what does that say about your beliefs, and why then do you continue believing them?

If you're not trolling and you sincerely got lost, then let me help you. Here's my very first post regarding Newman:

********************************************************************
" Someone here called me "Mr. Sola scriptura".

Consider what Cardinal John Henry Newman, whom the Roman Catholic Church recently made a Doctor of the Church, said:

"The more I read of Athanasius, Theodoret, etc., the more I see that the ancients did make the Scriptures the basis of their belief... when they met together in council, they brought the witness of tradition as a matter of fact, but when they discussed the matter in council, cleared their views, etc., proved their power, they always went to Scripture alone." - John Henry Newman, "Letter to Rev. R.H. Froude" (Aug 23, 1835), Letters and Correspondence of John Henry Newman p.113 (1890)

"All I have said is, that the Fathers all do appeal in all their controversies to Scripture as a final authority. When this occurs once only it may be an accident. When it occurs again and again uniformly, it does invest Scripture with the character of an exclusive Rule of Faith." - John Henry Newman, "Letter to F. Rogers" (Aug 31, 1837) Letters and Correspondence of John Henry Newman p. 113 (1890)


Looks like I'm in great company, no?
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Do you honestly see me arguing that Newman himself held to sola scriptura?

The funny thing is, your colleague FLBear had the same misunderstanding as you. I'm starting to think there is a relationship between miscomprehension and why people believe in Roman Catholicism.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Mm-hm.

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Light bulb go off?

If you fouled up like this here, maybe you're the one fouling up over there?

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Inasmuch as it rejects the authority of the Church, Newman sees sola scriptura as the very antithesis of what early Christians believed:

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Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it. They laugh at the very notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts; -- this is a reasonable question; -- no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that THIS is slavish. They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles; nor is there any doubt (who will deny it?) that those who thus boast of not being led blindfold, of judging for themselves, of believing just as much and just as little as they please, of hating dictation, and so forth, would have found it an extreme difficultly to hang on the lips of the Apostles, had they lived at their date, or rather would have simply resisted the sacrifice of their own liberty of thought, would have thought life eternal too dearly purchased at such a price, and would have died in their unbelief.

What they feel now, my brethren, is just what both Jew and Greek felt before them in the time of the Apostles, and what natural man has felt ever since. The great and wise men of the day looked down upon faith, then as now, as if it were unworthy the dignity of human nature: 'See your vocation, brethren that there are not, among you, many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not may noble; but the foolish things of the world hath God chosen to confound the strong, and the mean things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, hath God chosen, and things that are not, that He might destroy the things that are, that no flesh might glory in His sight'. Hence the same Apostle speaks of 'the foolishness of preaching'. Similar to this what our Lord had said in His prayer to the Father: 'I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto the little ones'. Now, is it not plain that the men of this day have just inherited the feelings and traditions of these falsely wise and fatally prudent persons in our Lord's day? They have the same obstruction in their hearts to entering the Catholic Church, which Pharisees and Sophists had before them; it goes against them to believe her doctrine, not so much for want of evidence that she is from God, as because, if so, they shall have not their own cultivation or depth of intellect, and because they must receive a number of doctrines, whether they will or no, which are strange to their imagination and difficult to their reason. The very characteristic of the Catholic teaching and of the Catholic teacher is to them a preliminary objection to their becoming Catholics, so great, as to throw into the shade any argument however strong, which is producible in behalf of the mission of those teachers and the origin of that teaching. In short, they have not faith.

They have not in them the principle of faith; and I repeat, it is nothing to the purpose to urge that at least they firmly believe Scripture to be the Word of God. In truth, it is much to be feared that their acceptance of Scripture itself is nothing better than a prejudice or inveterate feeling impressed on them when they were children. Nay, I conceive that in most cases there is no submission of the reason at all; simply they are so familiar with the passages in question, that the narrative presents no difficulties to their imagination; they have nothing to overcome. If, however, they ARE led to contemplate these passages in themselves, and to try them in the balance of probability, and to begin to question about them, as will happen when their intellect is cultivated, then there is nothing to bring them back to their former habitual or mechanical belief; they know nothing of submitting to authority, that is, they know nothing of faith; for they have no authority to submit to. They either remain in the state of doubt without any great trouble of mind, or they go on to ripen into utter disbelief on the subjects in question, though they may say nothing about it. Neither before they doubt, nor when they doubt, is there any token of the presence in them of a power subjecting reason to the Word of God. No; what looks like faith, is a mere hereditary persuasion, not a personal principle; it is a habit which they have learned in the nursery, which has never changed into anything higher, and which is scattered and disappears, like a mist, before the light, such as it is, of reason. If, however, there are Protestants, who are not in one or other of these two states, either of credulity or of doubt, but who firmly believe in spite of all difficulties, they certainly have some claim to be considered under the influence of faith; but there is nothing to show that such persons, where they are found, are not in the way to become Catholics, and perhaps they are already called so by their friends, showing in their own examples the logical, indisputable connection which exists between possessing faith and joining the Church.

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Nothing here is saying that sola scriptura was the very antithesis of what the early church believed. In fact, he's making the case for sola scriptura in the early church - again. Sola scriptura holds that the word of the original apostles is the only infallible source of authority for the church. So effectively, the mindset of the early Christians who listened to them OVER the authority of their Jewish leaders, were of the same mindset of those in Newman's current day who were rejecting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in favor of the authority of the original apostles' witness, i.e. Scripture. Newman, ironically, in attempting to critique Protestants who adhere to sola scriptura, instead showed that they were doing the same thing as the first Christians. Newman had it backwards - it was actually those who accepted the authority of the Roman Catholic Church as being equal to and even over the authority of Scripture, who were the ones rejecting the authority of the witness of the original apostles.

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Newman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura.

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And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

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Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

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What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

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My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

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So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

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Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

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Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

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So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

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Man, you are COMPLETELY confused.

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I don't know who wouldn't be at this point. Anyway, Newman emphatically doesn't support your position.

Next topic: is the pope Catholic?

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Someone here called me "Mr. Sola scriptura".

Looks like I'm in great company, no?
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Do you honestly see me arguing that Newman himself held to sola scriptura?

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It certainly appears so, especially after the whole Augustine debate.

Sam LowryNewman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura. said:

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And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

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Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

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What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

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My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

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So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

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Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

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Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

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So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

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Man, you are COMPLETELY confused.

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I don't know who wouldn't be at this point. Anyway, Newman emphatically doesn't support your position.

Next topic: is the pope Catholic?

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Someone here called me "Mr. Sola scriptura".

Looks like I'm in great company, no?
********************************************************************

Do you honestly see me arguing that Newman himself held to sola scriptura?

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It certainly appears so, especially after the whole Augustine debate.

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Then that explains all of it - you have comprehension problems. It really all does make sense now.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Sam LowryNewman would reply that if you're unwilling to listen to the Apostles' successors, you wouldn't have listened to the Apostles either. At least we can agree that he was indeed a critic of sola scriptura. said:

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And Newman would be flat wrong, as well as be misunderstanding the whole concept of sola scriptura. If the apostles' successors didn't stay true to the original apostles' witness, but instead began to innovate, then they shouldn't be listened to. Because you ARE listening to the original apostles.

And Newman being a critic of sola scriptura was never in doubt. That was purely your miscomprehension. I'm glad you finally got it straightened out.

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Your back-pedaling is a lot to keep up with sometimes...but glad we agree.

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What am I back pedaling on? Are you lying again to save face?

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My understanding of your argument was that, according to John Henry Newman, the early church practiced sola scriptura. I apologize if I misread.

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So how did I back pedal from that? You never make sense.

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Are you still maintaining that Newman believed that?

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Of course. Can you not just answer my question? Where did I backpedal from that?

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So you initially claimed that Newman supported sola scriptura, but now you're saying he opposed it despite believing it was the clear practice of the early church. Interesting theory...back-pedaling straight into a dead end, it would seem.

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Man, you are COMPLETELY confused.

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I don't know who wouldn't be at this point. Anyway, Newman emphatically doesn't support your position.

Next topic: is the pope Catholic?

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Someone here called me "Mr. Sola scriptura".

Looks like I'm in great company, no?
********************************************************************

Do you honestly see me arguing that Newman himself held to sola scriptura?

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It certainly appears so, especially after the whole Augustine debate.

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Then that explains all of it - you have comprehension problems. It really all does make sense now.

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Or you were ambiguous. Although, to your credit, you did get a lot clearer after it was pointed out that you were using an outdated quote.