The Authority Debate Between Jimmy Akin And The Other Paul

You can watch it here. Paul made some good points, but I want to add some points of my own, in response to Jimmy and in response to what came up in the question and answer segment.

Jimmy appealed to the paradigm of scripture, tradition, and magisterium that he claims we see during the time of the apostles. But he acknowledged that Divine revelation started orally during the Old Testament era, without scripture or a magisterium. Furthermore, the forms those oral revelations took varied a lot, and we have no reason to think that everything God revealed during the Old Testament era was infallibly maintained throughout Old Testament history by some sort of equivalent of the Roman Catholic paradigm. To the contrary, revelation was sometimes lost or disregarded on a significant scale (e.g., 2 Kings 22:8-13, Nehemiah 8:13-17). And to the extent that Jimmy had fallible oral communication in mind during the Old Testament era, a Protestant paradigm allows for that in the New Testament era as well. There wasn't a paradigm of scripture, tradition, and magisterium comparable to Roman Catholicism during at least most of the Biblical era.

Even during the time of the apostles, was there an infallible magisterium in any relevant way? Jimmy's appeal to the inclusion of the elders in Acts 15:23 is insufficient. The Other Paul discussed First Clement during the debate, and he brought up the issue of the authorship of that document in the process. First Clement is written in the name of the church of Rome. It doesn't follow that everybody in the Roman church at the time, both leaders and laymen, had equal authority. Similarly, Acts 15:23 could cite the elders who were present without their having the attributes Jimmy assigns to them. We know from other evidence, such as what's discussed here, that the apostles had more authority than non-apostolic elders. The Jerusalem elders mentioned in Acts 15:23 were respected leaders who were worth citing (after the apostles) in that context, but it doesn't follow that they had the role Jimmy assigns to them. Verse 22, like First Clement, even refers to "the whole church", but we don't conclude that the laymen, deacons, etc. involved were acting as an infallible magisterium. Appeals to other passages, like 1 Timothy 3:15, are likewise insufficient for reasons Protestants have discussed many times.

After the apostles died, there was no ongoing new public revelation. And memories of Jesus' oral teaching and the oral teaching of the apostles would fade over time. Jimmy's appeal to the existence of such oral teachings during the time of the apostles is insufficient, since it leaves out other factors that also need to be taken into account. It's expected that people like the apostles will eventually die if Jesus doesn't return first, and it's expected that memories of oral teaching will fade over time. Rather than a Protestant needing to demonstrate that such typical scenarios occurred, people like Jimmy need to demonstrate that something unusual occurred instead, so that there's a Roman Catholic magisterium or some equivalent infallibly maintaining all of the relevant oral and written revelations over time. A Protestant can accept scripture based on the evidence we have for it while rejecting other sources people like Jimmy appeal to, since there's a lack of evidence for those. We arrive at sola scriptura by process of elimination. As The Other Paul mentioned during the debate, somebody like Irenaeus could have good reason to reject sola scriptura (e.g., reliable information about extrabiblical apostolic teaching from Polycarp), but it wouldn't follow that Irenaeus' position is equivalent to Roman Catholicism's (it's not) or that we today are in a situation comparable to that of Irenaeus (we're not).

So, Jimmy's appeal to scripture, tradition, and magisterium fails. The existence of oral teaching from Jesus and the apostles doesn't carry with it the implication that the oral teaching will exist throughout church history in that oral form or any form needed for a Roman Catholic paradigm or any equivalent. And there's no reason to think that a magisterium with the relevant attributes existed.

Near the end of Jimmy's opening statement, he says that there isn't much in the New Testament that addresses the post-apostolic era. But the departure passages I've referred to elsewhere have some relevance here. When Paul and Peter are anticipating their death in 2 Timothy and 2 Peter, for example, they presumably don't know whether every other apostle will also be dead soon. So, how Paul and Peter prepare their audiences for their (Paul and Peter's) death isn't equivalent to preparing them for the post-apostolic age. But it does have some relevance. For one thing, Peter was a Pope under a Roman Catholic scenario, so any apostle who was still alive after Peter's death would have a lesser authority than Peter and his successors. And even though Paul and Peter knew that one or more of the other apostles could outlive them, their own deaths would have underscored the potential for the other apostles to die and the need for preparing for that scenario. Yet, they show no awareness of anything like a papacy or infallible magisterium. The pattern in these passages of referring to sources like past apostolic teaching and scripture without referring to anything like a papacy or infallible magisterium makes more sense under a Protestant paradigm. See my article linked earlier in this paragraph for more details. In addition to the three portions of the New Testament I discuss there (Acts 20, 2 Timothy, 2 Peter), think of the writings of John. He probably wrote in his elderly years, and, like Paul and Peter, he keeps calling on his audience to remember things like apostolic teaching and scripture, but shows no awareness of anything like a papacy or infallible magisterium.

Shortly before the question and answer segment, the issue of the canon came up. Jimmy said that "we must accept it [the canon] from the church". While it's true that the church is involved, that church isn't the Roman Catholic Church, and factors other than the church are involved as well. Early in the debate, Jimmy cited the Didache on the issue of the mode of baptism. And we get some of our information relevant to the canon from the Didache (e.g., its use of gospel material). But we don't know who wrote the document. Even when somebody known to be a church leader wrote something pertaining to the canon, such as Irenaeus or Cyprian, it doesn't follow that what he wrote is equivalent to "the church" in any relevant sense or that his comments are infallible. Our judgments about the canon rely on a large number and variety of sources, including non-Christian ones. The same is true of judgments Catholics make about the Catholic canon (which includes more than what they consider scripture). Just as Protestants accept their canon by means outside their rule of faith, Catholics accept their canon by means outside their rule of faith. We all make decisions about such issues on the basis of what our fallible parents taught us, what our fallible local church leaders told us, our fallible historical research involving fallible Christian and non-Christian sources discussed by and translated by fallible sources, etc. And while Protestants generally agree about a 66-book canon of scripture, Catholics have less agreement among themselves about their canon, which involves more than scripture. For more about issues like these, see my posts here, here, and here, for example. On canonical issues more broadly, go here.

A questioner raised the issue of the problem illiteracy supposedly poses for sola scriptura. But the Catholic rule of faith also involves written sources. A much larger, more complicated, and more controversial collection of them, in fact (a larger canon of scripture, conciliar documents, papal decrees, etc.). And there are many issues the individual Catholic has to sort through apart from judging written sources. Even if a local priest or bishop tells an illiterate Catholic layman what their denomination teaches, that priest or bishop isn't infallible by Catholic standards. And how does the layman know that he should be a Catholic to begin with? We all have to rely on individual judgment, including judgments about written sources. Illiteracy is a disadvantage in many contexts in life, including for Catholics. The illiterate Catholic would have some advantages over the illiterate Protestant under a Catholic paradigm (e.g., the church using more modern language in its infallible teachings), but would be at a disadvantage in other contexts (e.g., having to sort through a larger number of potential and actual infallible sources, including written ones).

Jimmy claimed that sola scriptura wasn't even "thinkable" and wasn't articulated until the invention of the printing press in the 1400s. See my recent posts about the Lollards, especially the one here, for some counterexamples. Some of the Lollards held to sola scriptura or something significantly similar and did so prior to the invention or popularizing of the printing press. See here regarding a Catholic scholar making similar comments about pre-Reformation sources on a broadcast produced by Catholic Answers, an organization Jimmy works for. And sola scriptura is found in sources prior to the Lollards. Even if a Catholic would deny that such sources actually had sola scriptura in mind, there would have to be a further argument that the view in question is significantly different than sola scriptura. For example, Tertullian wrote, "for the faith of some, either too simple or too scrupulous, demands direct authority from Scripture for giving up the shows, and holds out that the matter is a doubtful one, because such abstinence is not clearly and in words imposed upon God's servants." (The Shows, 3) Why should we believe that sola scriptura wasn't even "thinkable" to people like those Tertullian referred to? If you not only demand scriptural warrant for a view, but even demand that it be "clearly" there (and I agree with Tertullian that it's unreasonable to make that demand), then sola scriptura is either on your mind or well within reach (thinkable).