Recently, I've seen a few individuals writing about my personal take on the Baptist concept of the priesthood of believers/the priesthood of the believers. In part this is due to a comment I made on Wade Burleson's blog last week. In part, it is due to a comment I made regarding confessions and confessionalism at Strange Baptist Fire and an article there. You will notice, there is not a comment section here. There's a reason for this. First, I just wanted to do it because Pike said something about comments. It's my attempt at humor in that regard. Also, apparently at least one person feels I "owe" him "several responses." Well, so he won't be disappointed, he can read my statements here and not feel that if I don't respond he has been slighted. This is a statement to answer the questions and concerns put forth by others in other venues who have asked or whom I have read and don't believe that they quite "get" my position. It is not open for disputation here, since apparently at least one individual has felt it is worth disputation elsewhere, and this view has been put forth by others and he appears to be impervious to anything other than disputation about it already with others who hold the same or a similar view. This will just give him one less person with whom to argue. Also, I just plain don't feel well right now, so I may not be back for awhile. It's less of an item for me to have to keep track.
This issue is a hot topic in SBC circles because there are those who are deriving the right of private interpretation of the Scriptures from it. When I disagree, they somehow get the impression that I am denying the historic meaning of the term or the right of private interpretation. This is muddled in several respects, so this article is my attempt to shed some light on my personal position.
First, it is no secret I do not believe the BFM is a useful confession of faith anymore. I have been quite consistent for some time now in stating that I prefer the older Baptist confessions of faith. They are written in far better fashion and don't suffer from the "39 Articles of the Christian Religion Syndrome" of the BFM. The BFM is the 4th iteration of the NHC. Most folks interpret it like it was written in 1963 or 2000, so they pour their own meaning into it. Likewise, they don't take account of the meaning of the terms in the NHC or the 1925, so the SBC at present has a confession that suffers from being read by too many people too broadly while being a broad confession. It could stand to be revised using the old High Protestant Orthodox method of employing positive and negative articles, and that's just for starters. Right now, you have folks who are reading the BFM as, for example, synergists, and others and monergists. These two positions contradict each other. The BFM cannot support both. Likewise, at present, I am in a brand new church plant, so I am outside the SBC. If SBC folks wish to dismiss what I have to say because of that, then sobeit. Nevermind, until then I was in the SBC from my conversion onwards and my family goes back in SBC life at least 3 generations. It is also likely that the Brabourne about whom John Bunyan wrote was one of my ancestors. He was a "7th Day" Baptist. I think my "Baptist credentials" are up-to-date.
Likewise, one young woman whom I respect a great deal, with respect to confessions brought up the issue of PPL (private prayer language) in the SBC, another topic of discussion. I agree, PPL is not addressed in the BFM, ergo attempts to use it to justify or contradict the doctrine fall outside the BFM, but this isn't because of a problem in the way confessions are used per se; rather the problem here lies in elevating "Baptist distinctives" – in this case cessationism – to a rationalistic principle around which the BFM is interpreted or constructed. The anti-PPL people have done just that. Likewise, it seems to me that her position – appealing to the priesthood of believers – over and against the confession is no different. All she has done is employ one "historic Baptist principle" over another allegedly "historic Baptist principle," so her own position is not functionally any different than the one she opposes. In so doing she has conflated the right of personal interpretation of Scripture in Baptist thought and Protestant theology at large with the priesthood of believers/the believer. These principles intersect but they are not the same.
I agree that Scripture trumps the BFM. I agree that confessions are not be believed simply because they are confessions. I agree they are derivative documents, and revisable. However, I also believe that the older confessions in particular are better confessions and well tried; that is why I employ them. There is a vast body of literature on the right use of them emanating from the Reformed tradition in particular; I will touch on this more later. I also affirm that it is enough to trump the BFM with the BFM by showing it does not address the issue. The issue of Scripture and the BFM arises if there is a move to revise the BFM, as it pertains to the administration of the denomination.
It is exceptionally difficult to construe this doctrine, the priesthood of the believer/believers, in an individualistic manner. One gentleman who appears to have sympathy with the moderate wing of the Convention (saying that the BFM "killed what was born @ Calvary) wanted to know when they changed this doctrine from priesthood of the believer to the priesthood of believers. As I pointed out, this "change" was the other way around. It is hard to see how the BFM 2000 "killed" this doctrine since, when you take a tour through other theological traditions in this regard as well as our own, you find views much more sympathetic to the BFM 2000's view than the one he apparently espouses. This concept is not simply a Baptist distinctive; it is a also Reformational distinctive and antedates Baptistery. It becomes a "Baptist" distinctive when wedded to an ecclesiology that includes a regenerate church membership. Baptists do not have the corner market on the priesthood of believers/the believer. Likewise, this individual wanted to know which I thought was to the best terminology. By way of reply, that depends on what is meant. Unlike some, I try to be precise in my terminology, so I don't throw theological jargon around lightly.
First, what does this term mean in Scripture? The locus classicus is, of course , but where does this text turn this into a license for the right to interpret or study Scripture and the right of individual interpretation? Peter draws on the rock – stone language of Scripture in the OT to speak of Christ building a church, a non-spatial temple that is composed of believers all of whom are priests within it. The emphasis here is not on the right of the individual to interpret Scripture, but the priestly status and function of the covenant community as a whole. Each individual is a priest, that is very true, and there is no sacerdotal class to be found in this text; no covenant Mediator of salvation beyond Christ the Great High Priest, but, again, where is the reference to private interpretation? The references here are to being a people, a nation of priests, a covenant community. Those seeking to construct this idea from this text will have to look elsewhere.
What of the language of offerings in the New Testament? Some of this language appears in Hebrews . Also, drawing on the OT images, Paul speaks of us offering our bodies as living sacrifices (chapter 12). He writes of us offering "faith." (). He speaks of our preaching, doing evangelism, the conversion of others, and this is described as an offering acceptable to God (). In church government, one can relate this concept to a check on the authority of elders. The members are free to "vote with their feet" if need be, or, if the local church has settled on a more strictly congregational polity, vote their elders out. Again, where is this idea the priesthood relates to private interpretation of Scripture? Hebrews speaks of believers as a priesthood that can enter into the holy of holies and "continually offer up sacrifices of praise to God, that is the fruit of lips that acknowledge His name" (Hebrews).
Intersecting with these images, Scripture ascribes a prophetic office to the believer and his community. It also places (eschatological) significance on the kingly office. In short, the threefold ministry of Christ as the mediator of the New Covenant is carried out by us as His representatives by the power of the Holy Spirit in an analogous fashion. We preach the Word, men are converted by the Spirit's power, applying the benefits of redemption to them. We pray for others; the Spirit intercedes for us; Christ intercedes with the Father.
One young lady has said to me:
Priesthood of the Believer does say that we have the same Holy Spirit and we do read the Bible for ourselves and interpret it as the Holy Spirit guides. There is only one true interpretation.
I agree in principle, but I must ask her to show where this is to be found in relation to this particular doctrine in Scripture. If there is "only one true interpretation" how does she know she has it? Her "Holy Spirit intuition?" I hope not. If so, that's Henry Blackaby and Experiencing God talking, not grammatical-historical exegesis and its work. That position is dangerous because it can lead to the Quaker error on the one hand and mysticism or to Barthian "Scripture is a channel of revelation" thinking on the other. The Reformed tradition, and the current position of the BFM 2000 I might add in response to an interlocutor on Wade's blog, strives to chart a middle course.
What is missing here is a theology of illumination and a theology of revelation. Neo-orthodoxy and Quakerism conflate them. Quakerism tended to elevate the Spirit at the expense of the Word. Neo-orthodoxy tended to equate the Word, the Spirit, and Christ in its theology of revelation. Keswickism, which seems to lie at the root of much of the "interpret Scripture on your own" thinking of the Henry Blackaby set, is quite like Quakerism. Functionally, there is little difference. Calvin complained about the impossibility of rational discussion with people who punctuated every other sentence with references to what the Spirit had told them.
For the record, I do not construe the doctrine of illumination as some sort of direct mind-to-mind contact between the individual and the Holy Spirit. I agree substantially with Steve Hays here who construes illumination as being very like (if not a product of) regeneration. The Spirit keeps us teachable and applies the Word of God to wash us of sin and its noetic effects. Essentially, He keeps our eyes and ears open, but He does not whisper the hermeneutical solution into our spiritual ears through some sort of inner voice or revelatory "encounter." This is not to be confused with a deistic view of interpretation, in which providence is in abeyance. Do not make that mistake either.
Illumination is the process by which God's Holy Spirit enables us to understand His word and apply it to our lives.
J.I. Packer tells us that,
"The knowledge of divine things to which Christians are called is more than a formal acquaintance with biblical words and Christian ideas. It is a realizing of the reality and relevance of those activities of the triune God to which Scripture testifies. Such awareness is natural to none, familiar with Christian ideas though they may be (like "the man without the Spirit" in who cannot receive what Christians tell him, or the blind leaders of the blind of whom Jesus speaks so caustically in , or like Paul himself before Christ met him on the Damascus road). Only the Holy Spirit, searcher of the deep things of God, can bring about this realization in our sin-darkened minds and hearts. That is why it is called "spiritual understanding" (spiritual means "Spirit-given," . Those who, along with sound verbal instruction, "have an anointing from the Holy One... know the truth".
The work of the Spirit in imparting this knowledge is called "illumination," or enlightening. It is not a giving of new revelation, but a work within us that enables us to grasp and to love the revelation that is there before us in the biblical text as heard and read, and as explained by teachers and writers. Sin in our mental and moral system clouds our minds and wills so that we miss and resist the force of Scripture. God seems to us remote to the point of unreality, and in the face of God's truth we are dull and apathetic. The Spirit, however, opens and unveils our minds and attunes our hearts so that we understand. As by inspiration he provided Scripture truth for us, so now by illumination he interprets it to us. Illumination is thus the applying of God's revealed truth to our hearts, so that we grasp as reality for ourselves what the sacred text sets forth.
Illumination, which is a lifelong ministry of the Holy Spirit to Christians, starts before conversion with a growing grasp of the truth about Jesus and a growing sense of being measured and exposed by it. Jesus said that the Spirit would "convict the world" of the sin of not believing in him, of the fact that he was in the right with God the Father (as his welcome back to heaven proved), and of the reality of judgment both here and hereafter. This threefold conviction is still God's means of making sin repulsive and Christ adorable in the eyes of persons who previously loved sin and cared nothing for the divine Savior.
The way to benefit fully from the Spirit's ministry of illumination is by serious Bible study, serious prayer, and serious response in obedience to whatever truths one has been shown already. This corresponds to Luther's dictum that three things make a theologian: oratio (prayer), meditatio (thinking in God's presence about the text), and tentatio (trial, the struggle for biblical fidelity in the face of pressure to disregard what Scripture says)."
Thus "illumination" applies to every verse in the Bible.
Again, where is the right of private interpretation to be found here? That is, at most, an inference from these texts and doctrines but what these texts have in common explicitly is not, as Timothy George states, a status of the individual, but the service of the individual within the covenant community and external to that community, as when evangelism is depicted as a sort of priestly service. Ergo, the priesthood of "the" believer is not to be divorced from the priesthood of believers. To assert an either/or distinction is a false disjunction. Likewise, to retreat to it for a license to believe whatever you want from Scripture is not the way this doctrine was meant to be construed, and such a position is simply unsupportable from the Scriptures.
This means that the right of private interpretation does not emanate from this function as such. On the contrary, in the OT, when we see this being exercised by the priestly class to draw conclusions to make judgments; it was a function of their community. The prophets themselves received a word from the Lord, but again, they understood this as part of a community of thinking within OT Yahwism as well as individuals hearing from God or an angel. It is common practice in Christian-Jewish apologetics to refer not only to Scripture but the rabbis to show where a great deal of NT Scripture's take on the OT can be found in the wider corpus of Jewish theological writing. Likewise to conflate the work of the prophets with the right of private interpretation, particularly in the New Covenant era, is to conflate revelation and illumination. Inscripturation has ceased. Individual believers today are not prophets proclaiming an inspired message or composing inspired Holy Writ straight from God. Certainly each individual can and should study Scripture for himself, but this does not mean that the right of private interpretation is an absolute right, where the community must tolerate whatever conclusion the individual has reached come what may. The community excluded the prophets, and God used this to judge the community. The community listened to the prophets too, and God used this to bless the community and relent.
Nor does it mean that "the mind of the church" should be invoked every time a believer studies Scripture as if the individual cannot or should not differ with the community or must rely on commentaries and confessions. (On the other hand, in 2000 or so years of exegesis, it is seriously doubtful anybody is going to arrive at some new groundbreaking conclusions). One is to err to defect where it's all about the individual; the other is to err to excess, where there is no variation at all or worse, where all doctrines are "fundamental" (the Lutheran error of which Turretin wrote) or even worse, dogmatic faith in every prescribed article from the ecclesiastical authority = saving faith, which is just another form of Gnosticism. One leads to anarchy and latitudinarianism; the other leads to legalism. In other words, one leads to the Book of Judges, where each did what was right in his own eyes, and the other leads to the Sanhedrin of the First Century or Rome post-Trent. Both are to be avoided.
So, where do I stand on the right of private interpretation? I certainly affirm it, but I do not affirm it because of some doctrine of inner light ala the Quakers or the Henry Blackaby school of determining God's will, or Pentecostalism, or a "Christocentric" revelational model, ala Barth and his followers. Rather, my beliefs in this matter fall under the rubric of Sola Scriptura itself, that is, the doctrine of Scripture; its authority, clarity and perspicuity, and its right use and the historic affirmations that all individual believers have not a right, but a duty, to read and understand Scripture for themselves going back well past the Reformation into the writing of John Chrysostom and Augustine and many others. I argue for it from the infallibility of Scripture itself; from the perspicuity of Scripture itself, etc.; from the example of the Bereans; from Jesus words in Matthew and elsewhere; from Paul's charge to Timothy to study himself and so forth. It, like the concept of the priesthood of believers, can also be found in the OT, where certain commands, for example in Deuteronomy, are predicated on the individual reading and interpreting Scripture for himself and with his family and as part of the wider community; and fulfilling the nation's prophetic, priestly service (or failing to do so) to the world externally and to each other internally. In other words, I argue for it, but not from the commonly used platform in Baptist circles, but from the platform of the doctrine of Scripture and its material and formal sufficiency, etc., so do not mistake my stand on the priesthood of believers/the believer with my stand on the right of private interpretation; they intersect; but they are not the same. Thus, when you find me taking a particular view on the priesthood concept it is because I differentiate between that concept and the doctrine of Scripture. The latter, not the former, is, in my view, the better platform from which to argue the right of private interpretation - and the former in particular should be caveatted to prevent abuse. It is the responsibility and right of each believer, with regard to the priesthood concept, not because he is priest in the 1 Peter sense, per se, although that is true in that the priesthood is composed of individual priests, but because s/he is a priest within a covenant community of them and that community needs them. It is a concept that intersects with the priesthood concept, but it is not synonymous with it. This is why I will state that what is "best" in terminology depends on what the individual means. Words form sentences and concepts. A man or woman's right of private interpretation is not a license. Timothy George, quoting Eastwood, a Methodist, no less, notes,
"The common error that the phrase "Priesthood of Believers" is synonymous with "private judgment" is most unfortunate and is certainly a misrepresentation . . . . Of course, the Reformers emphasized "private judgment," but it was always "informed" judgment, and it was always controlled, checked, and corroborated by the corporate testimony of the congregation. Indeed Calvin himself fully realized that uncontrolled private judgment means subjectivism, eccentricity, anarchy, and chaos."
For more on this see: http://www.founders.org/FJ03/article1_fr.html Also, see Eastwood's text.
Those who differ from the more moderate arm of the Convention tend to quote at length from statements of Baptists from the 19th century and beyond or discuss the Baptist view of the freedom of conscience and religious liberty. This obscures the exegetical construct and the dogmatic history of this doctrine. Further, one can detect a subtle shift from "religious liberty" to "priesthood of the believer" to "soul competency" such that some I have read have begun with one concept and wound up at another. This is sloppy theology. These three are intersecting, but not synonymous principles. The right of individual responsibility to stand before God soteriologically is not "the priesthood of the believer." The lack of any mediator than Christ for the believer is not "religious liberty," nor is it the right of private interpretation.
One has stated:
"Certainly, the biblical interpretations of the Manifesto writers are open to dispute. However, there is a simpler and more definitive way to examine their case. If Christians, throughout history, had accepted the congregational view, Baptists would still be Catholics. It was the individual interpretations of men, led by the Holy Spirit, which brought about most church advancements. Would these Manifesto writers say that Martin Luther had no right to come to his own conclusions and disagree with the confession of his Roman Church? Should Roger Williams not have fought his Congregationalist Church for the separation of church and state? Was William Tyndale indeed a heretic for translating the Holy Bible? If it were not for the individual interpretations of the Reformers, Protestant theology may never have developed."
This simply ignores the Reformers' sense of connectedness with the Ancient Church itself. Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Tyndale, Bucer, et.al. were all trained in the Fathers. They did not simply ground their ideas in Scripture and nothing else, e.g. Solo Scriptura. Indeed, their theology proper, Christology, and pneumatology shows a very deep connectedness to the Ancient Church. Their view was that Rome, particularly her priestly hierarchy and thus her churches, had become apostate and obscured the gospel, keeping it from the people. They therefore believed they, not Rome and her councils, popes, priests, and ecclesiastical orders, were the legitimate heirs of the Ancient Church. They therefore sought to demonstrate that. Indeed, on the issues of Scripture, ecclesiology, and soteriology, they argued not only from Scripture but from the Fathers and from the Schoolmen. The difference lay in their belief that Scripture alone was infallible. These others were ancillary. This writer would do well to read the vast body of literature on post-Reformation dogmatics before making such distorted claims.
So, what about the use of confessions? Where do I stand on this? First, I differentiate between a confession for a local church and a confession for the association or the denomination. Second, I affirm that the association has the right to exclude any church or individual it wishes. The tradeoff for the right of private interpretation is the right of the majority to disagree and, yes, exclude if they so choose. Indeed, in Scripture, there are plenty of examples where we are told to mark out false teachers. The issue is "What constitutes false teaching at the local level, the associational level, etc.?" How much latitude should we exercise? Also, "no creed but the Bible" sounds cool, but what does that mean? Jehovah's Witnesses can make that same claim. Alexander Campbell made that claim in the 19th century too. My Baptist brethren would do well to remember that.
For the most part, I agree with Sam Waldron:
A confession of our loyalty to the Bible is not enough. The most radical denials of biblical truth frequently coexist with a professed regard for the authority and testimony of the Bible. When men use the very words of the Bible to promote heresy, when the Word of truth is perverted to serve error, nothing less than a confession of Faith will serve publicly to draw the lines between truth and error. …
The church is to "hold fast the form of sound words", to "contend earnestly for the faith which was once delivered to the saints", and to "stand fast with one spirit, with one soul striving for the faith of the gospel". In the fulfilment of this task, a confession is a useful tool for discriminating truth from error and for presenting in a small compass the central doctrines of the Bible in their integrity and due proportions. ..
Nevertheless, our confessions are not inherently sacrosanct or beyond revision and improvement; and, of course, church history did not stop in the seventeenth century (or any other). We are faced with errors today which those who drew up the great confessions were not faced with and which they did not explicitly address in the confessions, but it is a task to be undertaken with extreme caution. …
A confession is a useful means for the public affirmation and defence of truth…(it) serves as a public standard of fellowship and discipline…(and it) serves as a concise standard by which to evaluate ministers of the Word." R. P. Martin in Samuel E. Waldron, A Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, (Evangelical Press, 1989), p9-23.
I also agree with Shedd,
"Every house divided against itself cannot stand.".
WGT Shedd was right, those who differ with this principle are"latitudinarian bigots," who in reality hate precision, do not love liberty, and who desire to impose their latitudinarian bigotry on everyone. (W.G.T. Shedd, Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1893). pp. 167-68.)
The Charleston Association's Discipline included references to churches falling into heresy and what to do. There are plenty of examples of Baptists using confessions at the associational level to include and exclude. "Back in the day" a lot of what passes for theology and ethics locally would have been dealt with long before the state convention level. NC would not be seeking to exclude sixteen churches at present over the homosexuality issue a century or more ago. A presbytery would have been formed from the churches and the association would have excluded the churches and/or publicly disciplined their elders through circular letters and questions answered. The association would have refused to seat the churches. The association would likely have voted with its own feet and left those churches behind if they refused to repent. This is not popular with some Baptists today. Too bad; you want the right to interpret Scripture the way you see fit, by all means you have it; but don't expect that to come without a price. Their objection to the price proves Shedd was right. It is also a price we must all pay if we wish to cooperate under the same roof. This price should drive us to work out our differences not bleat incessantly about them. It should drive us to sit down, hold a proverbial synod if we must, and work it out; if we still cannot come to a resolution, then we should part ways and be done with it - but only as a last resort.
This does not mean that a confession cannot be abused. On the contrary, I agree with the "Wade Burleson" wing of the SBC on that. This is no secret either. The issue, however, as I stated above, is not the use of the confession itself, but the elevation of concepts that are from deeper down in the confession to the level of a constructive doctrine around which all else is crafted and defended and / or the imposition of particular interpretations on the confession's text that the text's grammar and history do not support. The right use of a confession is predicated on a well thought out theology built on the right principia. Like the older confessions, when it lists a set of Scriptures, for example, it assumes that the exegesis of them is known and has been done and is available for review and that a certain amount of "preconfession" work has already been done. "Baptist principles," whether cessationism or the priesthood of the believer/believers, are not the right principia. That smacks of rationalism, and is no better than constructing a theology around libertarian freedom as the Open Theists, or predestination like hyper-Calvinists. That smacks of real philosophical rationalism at work, not run of the mill logical, systematic thinking, the sort of rationalism that is acceptable. That is by far a greater danger than the use of a confession or construing this priesthood concept in communal fashion. That is why I say opposing the BFM on PPL with "priesthood of the believer/s" just moves the question back one step and repeats the same sort of thinking process. My concern there is the way theology is constructed, not which principle/s is/are the best for a central plank or planks.
Some have stated
"What you are advocating in your definition is too close to the Roman Catholic Church and the days of the one Bible, one interpretation from the Priests and that just isn't so and never was."
By way of reply the RCC error was one of excess in making all articles a matter of saving faith on the one hand, as Turretin stated, and its blatantly defective soteriology and epistemology on the other. There never was "one interpretation" from the priests in the Middle Ages either.
Raymond E. Brown: To the best of my knowledge the Roman Catholic Church has never defined the literal sense of a single passage of the Bible. Raymond E. Brown, The Critical Meaning of the Bible (New York: Paulist Press, 1981), p. 40.
Raymond E. Brown, S.S.: Roman Catholics who appeal explicitly to Spirit-guided church teaching are often unaware that their church has seldom if ever definitively pronounced on the literal meaning of a passage of Scripture, i.e., what the author meant when he wrote it. Most often the church has commented on the on-going meaning of Scripture by resisting the claims of those who would reject established practices or beliefs as unbiblical. Raymond E. Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament (New York: Doubleday, 1997), p. 31.
Maurice Bévenot, S.J.: But very few indeed are the Scripture texts of which the Church authorities have defined the meaning, and even there, their intervention has generally been to say what Scripture does not mean, otherwise leaving open what it does. See his chapter "Scripture and Tradition in Catholic Theology" in F.F. Bruce and E.G. Rupp, eds., Holy Book and Holy Tradition (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1968), p. 181.
Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J.: When one hears today the call for a return to a patristic interpretation of Scripture, there is often latent in it a recollection of Church documents that spoke at times of the 'unanimous consent of the Fathers' as the guide for biblical interpretation.(fn. 23) But just what this would entail is far from clear. For, as already mentioned, there were Church Fathers who did use a form of the historical-critical method, suited to their own day, and advocated a literal interpretation of Scripture, not the allegorical. But not all did so. Yet there was no uniform or monolithic patristic interpretation, either in the Greek Church of the East, Alexandrian or Antiochene, or in the Latin Church of the West. No one can ever tell us where such a "unanimous consent of the fathers" is to be found, and Pius XII finally thought it pertinent to call attention to the fact that there are but few texts whose sense has been defined by the authority of the Church, "nor are those more numerous about which the teaching of the Holy Fathers is unanimous." (fn. 24) Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Scripture, The Soul of Theology (New York: Paulist Press, 1994), p. 70.
R. C. Fuller: Again, Scripture texts are incorporated into Dogmatic decrees in proof or illustration of partiular doctrines. appears in the Bull Inffabilis Deus defining the Immaculate Conception. Infallibility however applies only to the dogma defined and not to any particular argument adduced in support of it; hence the interpretation of , though of great weight, is not infallible by reason of its inclusion in this decree (cf. Durand, art. Exégèse DTC 1838). The number of texts infallibly interpreted by the Church is small: for further examples see Mangenot-Rivière, art. cit. 2317-9. It has been estimated that the total of such texts is under twenty, though there are of course many others indirectly determined (cf. Corluy, 426; Durand art. cit. 1838). It should also be observed that an infallible interpretation of a text does not necessarily exhaust its full meaning. See Dom Bernard Orchard, M.A., ed., A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1953), pp. 59-60.
R. C. Fuller: The number of texts determined by the consent of the Fathers is even smaller than that of the texts determined by the decrees of the Church. Dom Bernard Orchard, M.A., ed., A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1953), p. 60.
Johann Adam Möhler: Except in the explanation of a very few classical passages, we know not where we shall meet with a general uniformity of Scriptural interpretation among the fathers, further than that all deduce from the sacred writings, the same doctrines of faith and morality, yet each in his own peculiar manner; so that some remain for all times distinguished models of Scriptural exposition, others rise not above mediocrity, while others again are, merely by their good intentions and love for the Saviour, entitled to veneration. Johann Adam Möhler, Symbolism: Exposition of the Doctorinal Differences between Catholics and Protestants as evidenced by their Symbolical Writings, trans. James Burton Robertson (New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1997), pp. 301-302.
Johann Adam Möhler: Catholic theologians teach with general concurrence, and quite in the spirit of the Church, that even a Scriptural proof in favour of a decree held to be infallible, is not itself infallible, but only the dogma as defined. Johann Adam Möhler, Symbolism: Exposition of the Doctorinal Differences between Catholics and Protestants as evidenced by their Symbolical Writings, trans. James Burton Robertson (New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1997), p. 296.
Stravinskas: In the only declared exercise of papal infallibility, Pope Pius XII, after consultation with all the bishops of the Catholic Church, on November 1, 1950, proclaimed the Assumption of the Virgin Mary a doctrine of the Faith." Peter M.J. Stravinskas, Our Sunday Visitor's Catholic Encyclopedia (Huntington: Our Sunday Visitor, Inc., 1991), p. 100-101.
Stravinskas: It is also worth noting that whenever a rare, definitive interpretation is given, it is done only after consultation with the best exegetes of the day, as well as allowing for the divine guidance promised by Jesus to His Church (see ; )." Peter M. J. Stravinskas, The Catholic Church and the Bible (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987), pp. 15-16.
Patrick Madrid on : . . . the dogma being defined here is Peter's primacy and authority over the Church — not a formal exegesis of . The passages from and are given as reasons for defining the doctrine, but they are not themselves the subject of the definition. As anyone familiar with the dogma of papal infallibility knows, the reasons given in a dogmatic definition are not themselves considered infallible; only the result of the deliberations is protected from error. It's always possible that while the doctrine defined is indeed infallible, some of the proofs adduced for it end up being incorrect. Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction (San Diego: Basilica Press, 1999), p. 254.
Karl Von Hase: If the Catholic Church really believed in her infallibility, and did not prefer to hide the Divine pound in the earth, she would long ago have set forth a clear and well-defined list of all her teaching concerning the faith, instead of which we are now obliged to search for this, especially in its finer relations, from sources which in other respects are not irreproachable. On so many points are Catholic schools at variance with one another, and in rejoinder to every Protestant attack the appropriate subterfuge is of course that the Catholic teaching has been misunderstood or misrepresented.
It is only seldom that tradition, summoned to the support of newly arisen dogmas, corresponds to any extent with the rule upon which Vincentius laid stress, that it should have been believed everywhere, always, and by all. Karl Von Hase, Handbook to the Controversy with Rome, trans. A. W. Streane (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1909), Vol. 1, pp. 128-129.
My view of confessions is exactly that of the elders at Bethlehem Baptist Church on the local level. It is also largely the view of Turretin and Witsius and the High Orthodox Reformed on the associational/denominational level. It is by far the traditional Protestant view. If this smacks of Romanism, then the view being offered by this person smacks of Quakerism, but I don't believe that for a moment. This person needs some historical perspective before leveling such hyperbolic judgments. I agree with Andrew Fuller,
"If a religious community agrees to specify some leading principles which they consider as derived from the Word of God, and judge the belief of them to be necessary in order to any person's becoming or continuing a member with them, it does not follow that those principles should be equally understood, or that all their brethren must have the same degree of knowledge, nor yet that they should understand and believe nothing else. The powers and capacities of different persons are various; one may comprehend more of the same truth than another, and have his views more enlarged by an exceedingly great variety of kindred ideas; and yet the substance of their belief may still be the same. The object of articles [of faith] is to keep at a distance, not those who are weak in the faith, but such as are its avowed enemies." Andrew Fuller, Works 5:222.
My church uses the First London Confession. It requires ascription to particular articles for the members. I, and the elders, agree that every member need not be held to the level of accountability for every doctrine in the confession as the deacons or elders, ergo certain ones are essential; others are not. Essentially, I agree with the way the PCA uses the WCF and Bethlehem Church uses its confession. For example, you don't have to be a Calvinist to join the PCA. Some of their churches even accept credo-baptists. However, if you wish to be an elder, teacher, or deacon, you are held to a higher standard. You may differ with the confession with the approval of the presbytery. Bethlehem Baptist follows a similar pattern. I affirm the right of each local church to set its own parameters in that regard.
What is my position on fundamental articles? That's a very good question. My position is largely that of Turretin and Witsius. I would point readers to Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics Volume 1, the concluding chapter, by Richard Muller for more on that.
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