I see that dear old Dave is quoting me out of context:
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2009/04/was-fr-raymond-brown-liberal-modernist.html
I never said that Brown was a liberal, modernist, heterodox scholar by Catholic standards. Only by Protestant standards. So don't enlist me in support of your argument, Dave!
Moreover, it’s perfectly absurd to say that a man who was appointed to the Pontifical Biblical Commission by, I believe, two successive popes, was a Catholic “dissident.”
Armstrong is simply exposing the rift between mainstream Catholics like Brown and reactionary hacks like…well…like Armstrong.
As I’ve said before, Armstrong, like so many evangelical converts to Catholicism, is to the right of his adopted denomination. The irony is acute–which is why he’s so touchy on the subject.
After quoting me out of context, he compounds the error by quoting James White out of context. One thing you can say about Dave: when he’s wrong, he’s consistently wrong!
So Raymond Brown was a dissident who was appointed by two popes?
ReplyDeleteDave ought to kick back and relax in one his hot tubs while he contemplates moving out of quasi-sedevacantism and into the real thing.
Oh sure, he quotes you out of context, and follows that up with even worse affronts to Mr. White, but seriously - you gotta love the powder blue quote boxes. I once wore (to my shame or personal glory, depending on your take) a tuxedo in that exact color. ;)
ReplyDeleteSo Raymond Brown was a dissident who was appointed by two popes?
ReplyDeletePrecisely. This is something all Catholics need to come to terms with.
I never said that Brown was a liberal, modernist, heterodox scholar by Catholic standards.
Mr. Hays, surely you must admit that Brown was heterodox by historic Catholic standards.
BEN DOUGLASS SAID:
ReplyDelete"Mr. Hays, surely you must admit that Brown was heterodox by historic Catholic standards."
Yes, and therein lies the nub of the problem–the contradiction between historic Catholic standards and contemporary Catholic standards.
Not that the historic Catholic standards were all that great to begin with.
ReplyDelete>> Yes, and therein lies the nub of the problem–the contradiction between historic Catholic standards and contemporary Catholic standards.>>
ReplyDeleteYes, and therein lies the nub of the problem–the contradiction between historic Reformation standards and contemporary Evangeilcal standards.
Ooops...happy fingers...should read "Evangelical"
ReplyDeleteDavid,
ReplyDeleteA fallacious analogy since Protestant ecclesiology doesn't make the same claims for itself as Catholic ecclesiology.
And while you're here, do you think that Ray Brown was a dissident?
>>A fallacious analogy since Protestant ecclesiology doesn't make the same claims for itself as Catholic ecclesiology.>>
ReplyDeleteJohn Calvin:
For the Lord esteems the communion of his church so highly that he counts as a traitor and apostate from Christianity anyone who arrogantly leaves any Christian society, provided it cherishes the true ministry of Word and sacraments. He so esteems the authority of the church that when it is violated he believes his own diminished. [Institutes of the Christian Religion, 4.1.10, The Westminster Press (1960) edition, translated by Ford Lewis Battles, and edited by John T. McNeill, p. 1024.] (Broader context: HERE.)
>>And while you're here, do you think that Ray Brown was a dissident?>>
No.
David,
ReplyDeleteSteve was using an internal critique of the RCC system, not an external critique where both sides have the same standard.
David,
ReplyDeletei) Notice, in the very passage you quote, how Calvin qualifies his claim: "provided that..."
This is not an assertion regarding the unconditional authority of the church.
ii) Moreover, you're assuming that a 16C theologian sets the standard for ecclesiology. Wrong! Scripture sets the standard. That's why we're Protestant.
Hello Steve,
ReplyDeleteThanks for responding; you wrote:
>>i) Notice, in the very passage you quote, how Calvin qualifies his claim: "provided that..."
This is not an assertion regarding the unconditional authority of the church.>>
Me: Agreed. However, the historic landscape of just one of the branches which has come out of the magisterial Reformation of the 16th century defies Calvin’s qualification (see the link I provided above). The examples given in that post concern conservative churhces which fully embrace Calvin’s qualification: “the preaching of the Word and the observance of the sacraments”—yet they still split. The Bible teaches us that schism is SIN; Calvin teaches that schim is SIN; and yet, Protestantism as a whole has now for hundreds of years functionally ignored this SIN.
>>ii) Moreover, you're assuming that a 16C theologian sets the standard for ecclesiology. Wrong! Scripture sets the standard. That's why we're Protestant.>>
Me: No I am not—Calvin’s ecclesiology was based on one source: Scripture—I recogonize and acknowledge that. And Calvin, like historic Chirstians before him, understood that the visible Church has real authority, authority to form creeds and confessions; authority to discipline, et al.; and if history teaches us anything, when that authority is ignored, heresy and schism abound.
One Evangelical scholar, who has a good grasp of history, wrote:
The Reformers unequivocally rejected the teaching authority of the Roman Catholic Church. This left open the question of who should interpret Scripture. The Reformation was not a struggle for the right of private judgement. The Reformers feared private judgement almost as much as did the Catholics and were not slow to attack it in its Anabaptist manifestation. The Reformation principle was not private judgement but the perspicuity of the Scriptures. Scripture was ‘sui ipsius interpres’ and the simple principle of interpreting individual passages by the whole was to lead to unanimity in understanding. This came close to creating anew the infallible church…It was this belief in the clarity of Scripture that made the early disputes between Protestants so fierce. This theory seemed plausible while the majority of Protestants held to Luthern or Calvinist orthodoxy but the seventeenth century saw the beginning of the erosion of these monopolies. But even in 1530 Casper Schwenckfeld could cynically note that ‘the Papists damn the Lutherans; the Lutherans damn the Zwinglians; the Zwinglians damn the Anabaptists and the Anabaptists damn all others.’ By the end of the seventeenth century many others saw that it was not possible on the basis of Scripture alone to build up a detailed orthodoxy commanding general assent. (A.N.S. Lane, “Scripture, Tradition and Church: An Historical Survey”, Vox Evangelica, Volume IX – 1975, pp. 44, 45 – bold emphasis mine.) [http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/vox/vol09/scripture_lane.pdf]
Grace and peace,
David