Saturday, June 03, 2017

Let denominations bloom

https://rationalityofaith.wordpress.com/2015/05/28/the-superiority-of-a-thousand-protestant-denominations-over-the-dishonesty-of-screening-doctrinal-chaos-under-legal-unity-on-the-irish-gay-referendum-and-canonical-churches/

15 comments:

  1. "Here I am entirely Protestant on this point. Everyone must use their reason, their common sense and their own private judgement, to discern the Word of God for themselves, to study it to the best of their abilities and to the full conviction of their conscience, as to what is the truth."

    Here the author admits what many Protestants try to deny - there is no real difference between "sola scriptura" and "solo scriptura". Even if, as Matheson claims, Protestant churches should consider some sort of tradition as authoritative (although he can't provide clear guidelines how to identify that authoritative tradition), at the end of the day what matters in Protestantism is one's private interpretation of Scripture, making individual (not the Bible) the final authority. If that is the case, there is no reason why one's private judgment could not be used to discern which books are inspired, since Protestans don't have infallible canon (merely "fallible collection of infallible books" as Sproul, White and others admit).

    I would simply ask - since St. Peter warned that people can twist the Scripture to their own destruction due to their ignorance (2 Peter 3:16), and if all we have is our private interpretation of Scripture, how can anyone know he does not twist Scripture to his own distruction?

    "Ultimately remember the Protestant tenet that we are justified by faith alone in Christ, we are not justified by believing in justification by faith alone or some niggardly theological point. These theological points would have pastoral or practical effects upon our faith no doubt. However, they are not so crucial as to damn or save a person who slips upon a single point."

    Here the author seems to suggest that one can reject faith alone (which everyone should do, by the way) and it will not have impact upon his salvation as long as he believes in Jesus. This sounds like mere Christianity to me, which even Protestants rightly reject (is St. Paul's argument against the Judaizers from Galatians a "niggardly theological point", as the author put it?).

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    1. "Here the author admits what many Protestants try to deny - there is no real difference between 'sola scripture' and 'solo scripture'. Even if, as Matheson claims…"

      I criticized Matheson's distinction years ago.

      "at the end of the day what matters in Protestantism is one's private interpretation of Scripture, making individual (not the Bible) the final authority."

      At the end of the day, what matters in Catholicism is one's private interpretation of Scripture, church fathers, church councils, popes, &c., to arrive at the conclusion that Rome is the One True Church®–making the individual (not the Magisterium) the final authority.

      "I would simply ask - since St. Peter warned that people can twist the Scripture to their own destruction due to their ignorance (2 Peter 3:16), and if all we have is our private interpretation of Scripture, how can anyone know he does not twist Scripture to his own distruction?"

      Based on your private interpretation of 2 Pet 3:16.

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    2. "If that is the case, there is no reason why one's private judgment could not be used to discern which books are inspired, since Protestants don't have infallible canon (merely 'fallible collection of infallible books' as Sproul, White and others admit)."

      i) I've explained on several occasions how that's a simplistic view of how the books of the canon go together.

      ii) The Tridentine Fathers were divided on the OT canon, and what came to be the official position only passed by a plurality, not even a majority–much less a unanimous vote. What does that say about the discernment of the Magisterium?

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    3. "I criticized Matheson's distinction years ago."

      I'm glad to hear that, since many Protestant apologists (including James White) and individual Protestants I have talked to try to hide behind sola scriptura - solo scriptura distinction based on Matheson.

      "At the end of the day, what matters in Catholicism is one's private interpretation of Scripture, church fathers, church councils, popes, &c., to arrive at the conclusion that Rome is the One True Church–making the individual (not the Magisterium) the final authority."

      We went through this before - every claim to the final authority is necessarily a presuppositional one whether it is the Bible of the Catholic Church. There is always the highest level of authority which cannot be verified any further. To take your argument (which is tu quoque fallacy by the way) to logical conclusion you'd have to affirm the following statements:

      - At the end of the day, it is one's private interpretation of Scripture which leads to the conclusion that the doctrine of the Trinity is true, it could be wrong, Unitarianism might be correct.
      - At the end of the day, it is one's private judgment that the Bible is the Word of God, it can be incorrect.
      - At the end of the day, it is one's private judgment that God exists, it could be wrong.

      If you are willing to embrace the above statements, you have the point.

      "Based on your private interpretation of 2 Pet 3:16."

      More of tu quoque fallacy, which does not answer the question. If one's private interpretation of Scripture is the highest level of authority (as author of the article you linked explicitly and unapologetically admits) with no authority capable of verifying it, and Scripture teaches that private interpretation can lead one to destruction, how can anyone know they do not twist Scripture to their own destruction? Or is it merely a matter of probability - for example, Trinity being more probable than Unitarianism?

      "i) I've explained on several occasions how that's a simplistic view of how the books of the canon go together."

      It is merely a logical conclusion of a fallible canon. If a person in your church after a logn study and prayer comes to conclusion that 1 Clement is inspired and 2 Peter is not, from the Protestant epistemological point of view there is nothing but your private judgment to refute that, and the person could theoretically be correct and you can be in error. This is why sola scriptura is inoperational, because one cannot objectively know what Scripture actually is. Kruger's argument of self-authentication fails as well, because even if it were true (i.e. that every inspired book has self-identifying marks of inspiration), there is always a fallible human who can misinterpret or fail to recognize these self-authentication marks.

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    4. "ii) The Tridentine Fathers were divided on the OT canon, and what came to be the official position only passed by a plurality, not even a majority–much less a unanimous vote. What does that say about the discernment of the Magisterium?"

      As far as I remember the Canon with Deuterocanonical books was affirmed unanimously, the division was regarding whether to attach anathema for denying it or not (I will check it out, I could be wrong). But even if it was not, what matters is the official teaching of the Magisterium, not the way the Council technically arrived to it - personal opinion of an individual bishop or cardinal does not constitute part of the Universal Magisterium in any way, shape or form.

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    5. "Arvinger As far as I remember the Canon with Deuterocanonical books was affirmed unanimously, the division was regarding whether to attach anathema for denying it or not (I will check it out, I could be wrong)."

      According to Metzger, in his classic monograph on the NT canon, "Finally on 8 April 1546, by a vote of 24 to 15, with 16 abstentions, the Council issued a decree (De Canonicis Scripturis) in which, for the first time in the history of the Church, the question of the contents of the Bible was made an absolute article of faith and confirmed by an anathema," B. Metzter, The Canon of the New Testament (Oxford, 1987), 246.

      "But even if it was not, what matters is the official teaching of the Magisterium, not the way the Council technically arrived to it - personal opinion of an individual bishop or cardinal does not constitute part of the Universal Magisterium in any way, shape or form."

      That matters to you. But it demonstrate how artificial the official teaching is. And you drive an irrational wedge between the conclusion and the process of reasoning by which the conclusion is arrived at.

      In addition, the only intelligent distinction is between true and false opinion, not personal and official opinion.

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    6. "Arvinger We went through this before - every claim to the final authority is necessarily a presuppositional one whether it is the Bible of the Catholic Church."

      i) To call it "presuppositional" doesn't make it true or furnish any evidence for your final authority. That's just an arbitrary stipulation on your part.

      ii) And I don't grant the legitimacy of framing the issue in terms of authority.

      "If you are willing to embrace the above statements, you have the point."

      i) I'm not concerned with whether a "private opinion" could hypothetically be wrong, but whether, in fact, it is wrong, and evidence for the truth or falsity of "private options".

      ii) Ultimately, it's up to God in his providence whether our beliefs are true or false.

      "which is tu quoque fallacy by the way"

      A tu quoque argument is not fallacious. You need to consult better resources. For instance:

      "I am using ad hominem in the way Peter Geach uses it on pp. 26-27 of his Reason and Argument (Basil Blackwell 1976):

      'This Latin term indicates that these are arguments addressed to a particular man -- in fact, the other fellow you are disputing with. You start from something he believes as a premise, and infer a conclusion he won't admit to be true. If you have not been cheating in your reasoning, you will have shown that your opponent's present body of beliefs is inconsistent and it's up to him to modify it somewhere.'

      "As Geach points out, there is nothing fallacious about such an argumentative  procedure. If A succeeds in showing B that his doxastic system harbors a contradiction, then not everything that B believes can be true."  

      http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2015/11/the-problem-of-evil-and-the-argument-from-evil.html

      "If one's private interpretation of Scripture is the highest level of authority"

      You're stuck in the rut of "authority," and higher or lower levels of authority. Once again, I don't grant your tendentious framework. Moreover, it's getting carried a way with an architectural metaphor.

      "with no authority capable of verifying it"

      You keep assuming without argument that some "authority" is required to verify it. Good example of Catholic conditioning, where your incapable of thinking outside the box.

      Moreover, you have, by your own admission, no means to verify your final authority. No means to verify that the Magisterium is legitimate. You might as well flip a coin.

      "and Scripture teaches that private interpretation can lead one to destruction"

      Based on your private interpretation of 2 Pet 3:16, which by your own admission, is self-refuting.

      "Or is it merely a matter of probability - for example, Trinity being more probable than Unitarianism?"

      Your only arguments for Catholicism will involve probabilities.

      "It is merely a logical conclusion of a fallible canon."

      No, it's a merely illogical conclusion.

      For instance, the books of the canon aren't just a bunch of miscellaneous books. In some cases, the canon is a collection of collections. The Pentateuch doesn't consist of five random books, but a 5-part history by the same narrator. Same thing with Luke-Acts.

      Likewise, some books are naturally grouped by common authorship. Take the Pauline epistles.

      2C apocryphal Gospels are necessarily forgeries because they're too late to be written by their putative authors.

      I could discuss other aspects, but it illustrates your indifference to the internals of the canon. Catholicism fosters intellectual laziness.

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    7. Regarding Trent and Deuterocanon, from the Catholic Encyclopedia on Old Testament canon:
      "During the deliberations of the Council there never was any real question as to the reception of all the traditional Scripture. Neither - and this is remarkable - in the proceedings is there manifest any serious doubt of the canonicity of the disputed writings. In the mind of the Tridentine Fathers they had been virtually canonized, by the same decree of Florence, and the same Fathers felt especially bound by the action of the preceding ecumenical synod."
      The division was, as I said, due to the issue of anathema (whether to attach it to the decree or not), not because of Deuterocanonical books.

      "That matters to you. But it demonstrate how artificial the official teaching is. And you drive an irrational wedge between the conclusion and the process of reasoning by which the conclusion is arrived at."

      It is not irrational at all, it is how the Holy Ghost operates within the Church. Council Fathers are not like puppets who have no free will and no personal opinion on issues, but the Holy Ghost will never allow the Church's teaching to be erroneous. The Holy Ghost protects the teaching of the Church itself, not people's opinions or the process by which these teachings are agreed upon by the hierarchy.

      "In addition, the only intelligent distinction is between true and false opinion, not personal and official opinion."

      The dogmatic teaching of the Catholic Church is true, but opinion of certain members of the hierarchy on specific issues can be false.

      "i) To call it "presuppositional" doesn't make it true or furnish any evidence for your final authority. That's just an arbitrary stipulation on your part."

      As I said before, the statement that it is presuppositional is merely recognition of the fact that we can go only to a certain level in verifying the authorities we trust, without presuppositions we would fall into hard solipsism. There is always the highest authority which cannot be verified any further. Do you verify whether the Bible is indeed the Word of God? That does not mean that I simply assert it and can bring no Biblical and historical evidence for the truthfulness of the Catholic Church - but that was not the topic of discussion.

      "i) I'm not concerned with whether a "private opinion" could hypothetically be wrong, but whether, in fact, it is wrong, and evidence for the truth or falsity of "private options"."

      But how do you objectively know whether something is true or wrong if you have only your private interpretation/opinion? You can't because your private interpretation is fallible, so if you rely on it regarding - for example - the doctrine of the Trinity, then you can't know whether it is true with certainty. You have the same problem as an atheist - an atheist cannot know anything to be true, because everything he claims is based on his cognitive faculties the truthfulness of which he cannot verify. Likewise, you cannot know any doctrine to be true, because each of them relies on your private interpretation of the Bible which you cannot verify as objectively true.

      "A tu quoque argument is not fallacious. You need to consult better resources."

      It can be a fallacy in a specific context, if you use it to drive attention away from a question you cannot answer. Similarly, an argument from authority can be a fallacy in some contexts, but not in others.

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    8. "Moreover, you have, by your own admission, no means to verify your final authority. No means to verify that the Magisterium is legitimate. You might as well flip a coin."

      That is misrepresentation of what I said. I said that there is no higher level of authority that could verify the Magisterium (any claim to final authority is necessarily presuppositional - if it required verification it would not be final authority). That does not men that I can't put forward historical or Biblical arguments for the truthfulness of the Catholic Church. Same thing with Scripture - you don't verify whether Scripture is indeed the Word of God, but you could certainly put forward arguments why it is so (but the claim of Scriptural inspiration would not hinge upon these arguments).


      "You keep assuming without argument that some "authority" is required to verify it. Good example of Catholic conditioning, where your incapable of thinking outside the box."

      No, it is merely a practical response to the state of affairs in Proestantism with its hundreds of denominations and competing contradictory interpretations of the Bible. This creates a necessity to verify which of these interpretations are ture - if these interpretations are all we have, we cannot know what the Bible teaches with certainty, since all of these interpretations are fallible and none of them has any authority that the other doesn't have. If the Reformation had resulted in a single denomination with one doctrine it would be a different matter.
      "Based on your private interpretation of 2 Pet 3:16, which by your own admission, is self-refuting."

      The fact that is is my private interpretation does not mean it is wrong, but that it is fallible. Yes, I could be incorrect - if that is the case, refute my interpretation of 2 Peter 3:16. Does it not reach that there are people who are not learned enough and through their incorrect interpretation of Scripture lead themselves to destruction? If so, how can anyone in Protestantism know they do not fall into this category if they can't objectively verify the truthfulness of their numerous contradictory private interpretations?

      "Your only arguments for Catholicism will involve probabilities."

      So, you admit the doctrine of the Trinity is merely more probable than Unitarianism? The truth is that with Protestant epistemology the most you can say is this:
      "I believe that the doctrine of the Trinity is true on the basis of my interpretation of Scripture. However, I cannot know it with absolute certainty, since all I have is my fallible private judgment. Nevertheless, giving the weight of exegetical arguments I bring forward I can state that the Trinity is more probable than Unitarianism".

      Of course a Unitarian can say the same thing for his position.

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    9. "For instance, the books of the canon aren't just a bunch of miscellaneous books. In some cases, the canon is a collection of collections. The Pentateuch doesn't consist of five random books, but a 5-part history by the same narrator. Same thing with Luke-Acts.
      Likewise, some books are naturally grouped by common authorship. Take the Pauline epistles.
      2C apocryphal Gospels are necessarily forgeries because they're too late to be written by their putative authors.
      I could discuss other aspects, but it illustrates your indifference to the internals of the canon. Catholicism fosters intellectual laziness."

      You misunderstand the argument. What you write above are historical arguments - obviously, I don't mean to argue that the New Testament canon is different than the 27 books we agree on. I point out that in Protestantism any arguments for the canon, including everything you wrote above, are just private opinions and interpretations of historical data, and as such are fallible, so there is no certainty that the canon is correct. Without infallible canon any historical argument will be just your private, fallible interpretation of historical data, nothing more. Thus, you cannot have absolute certainty which books constitute Scripture. Either there is infallible authority which can infallibly recognize a canon or we can’t be sure what the Canon is.

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    10. i) Your solution fails to solve the problem you pose, for your alternative is just a paper theory. The fact that Catholicism lays claim to "absolute certainty" on some carefully circumscribed issues doesn't make that true or even plausible.

      You yourself can't escape "private opinion" and "interpretations of historical data". Either unaided reason can be trusted or not. If unaided reason is an unreliable guide to point you to the Magisterium, then you can't use the Magisterium to backstop unaided reason. For your belief in that "infallible authority" is a fallible belief in your infallible authority source. It's reducible to your personal judgment.

      ii) I don't fret over hypothetical scenarios that are beyond my control. What's the point of insisting on an unattainable standard of "absolute certainty"? That's an artificial bar, and it's self-defeating.

      I content myself with the situation that God has put us in. That's the best we can ever do.

      If, in God's providence, I'm mistaken about something, so what? We are all at the mercy God's providence.

      Inventing a theory of "infallible authority" is just a chimera to satisfy an a priori demand for "absolute certainty". But why assume that reality must conform to your demand?

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    11. "During the deliberations of the Council there never was any real question as to the reception of all the traditional Scripture. Neither - and this is remarkable - in the proceedings is there manifest any serious doubt of the canonicity of the disputed writings."

      To the contrary, from what I've read, the bishops subdivided into two equally traditional camps: those who took the position of Jerome and those who took the position of Augustine.

      "It is not irrational at all, it is how the Holy Ghost operates within the Church. Council Fathers are not like puppets who have no free will and no personal opinion on issues…"

      Actually, you are treating conciliar fathers as "puppets" because you think the Holy Spirit causes the truth of their conclusions to override the falsity of the justifications they provide for their conclusions. The conclusion is true even if the supporting reasons are false.

      "As I said before, the statement that it is presuppositional is merely recognition of the fact that we can go only to a certain level in verifying the authorities we trust, without presuppositions we would fall into hard solipsism. There is always the highest authority which cannot be verified any further."

      Transcendental arguments are just that…arguments. They're not merely stipulations that ascribe axiomatic status to a favored position. Take the following definitions:

      "Transcendental arguments are partly non-empirical, often anti-skeptical arguments focusing on necessary enabling conditions either of coherent experience or the possession or employment of some kind of knowledge or cognitive ability, where the opponent is not in a position to question the fact of this experience, knowledge, or cognitive ability, and where the revealed preconditions include what the opponent questions. Such arguments take as a premise some obvious fact about our mental life—such as some aspect of our knowledge, our experience, our beliefs, or our cognitive abilities—and add a claim that some other state of affairs is a necessary condition of the first one."

      "As standardly conceived, transcendental arguments are taken to be distinctive in involving a certain sort of claim, namely that X is a necessary condition for the possibility of Y—where then, given that Y is the case, it logically follows that X must be the case too. Moreover, because these arguments are generally used to respond to skeptics who take our knowledge claims to be problematic, the Y in question is then normally taken to be some fact about us or our mental life which the skeptic can be expected to accept without question (e.g., that we have experiences, or make certain judgements, or perform certain actions, or have certain capacities, and so on), where X is then something the skeptic doubts or denies (e.g., the existence of the external world, or of the necessary causal relation between events, or of other minds, or the force of moral reasons)."

      You need to show that belief in the infallible authority of the Magisterium is required by something a person "can be expected to accept without question"–which he's in no position to question. But Protestants don't grant Catholic assumptions in that regard, so you have nowhere to start. No relevant common ground.

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    12. "But how do you objectively know whether something is true or wrong if you have only your private interpretation/opinion? You can't because your private interpretation is fallible."

      Your skepticism is self-refuting. You can't argue for your alternative if you think reason is that unreliable. For you must use fallible arguments to reason for your alternative.

      The abstract possibility of error doesn't create any presumption that I'm wrong. Moreover, beliefs aren't created equal. Some beliefs have overwhelming evidence.

      "You have the same problem as an atheist - an atheist cannot know anything to be true, because everything he claims is based on his cognitive faculties the truthfulness of which he cannot verify."

      No, the atheist is in a worst situation because he believes things (e.g. evolutionary psychology) that generate positive undercutters or defeaters for the reliability of reason.

      "It can be a fallacy in a specific context, if you use it to drive attention away from a question you cannot answer."

      The question is whether your arguments are consistent.

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    13. "That does not men that I can't put forward historical or Biblical arguments for the truthfulness of the Catholic Church."

      But that's your only bridge to the Magisterium. You act like, once you cross the bridge, you can burn it because you finally arrived at the safety of an infallible authority source that confers absolute certainty.

      But that's an illusion, because it's just your fallible belief in the infallibility of the Magisterium. Your bridge never closes the gap. And that's exacerbated by your skepticism. You can't have "absolute certainty" in the Magisterium, because you can only arrive at your faith in the Magisterum via "private opinion". The Magisterium can never confer absolute certainty on any of your beliefs, because your underlying belief in the Magisterium is fallible.

      "since all of these interpretations are fallible and none of them has any authority that the other doesn't have."

      Your only explanatory category is "authority". You're hopelessly trapped in that simplistic paradigm.

      We don't need authority to assess interpretations. Rather, we evaluate the interpretation by the quality of the supporting arguments.

      If you think that's insufficient to verify truth-claims, then you've hamstrung your own ability to ever argue for the Magisterium. That's your intractable dilemma.

      "So, you admit the doctrine of the Trinity is merely more probable than Unitarianism?"

      What exactly would be wrong with that?

      And if the evidence God has left at our disposal tilts in the direction, what's wrong with judging by the evidence God has given us?

      "Of course a Unitarian can say the same thing for his position."

      You still don't get it. If you think all arguments and counterarguments are equal, then you can never produce an argument for Catholicism that's better than an argument for evangelicalism or atheism or unitarianism.

      Why do you keep wasting your time arguing for Catholicism, and arguing against Protestantism, when you simultaneously demean the value of arguments to prove anything?

      Not to mention that you're a sedevacantist, so your alternative is riddled with tensions.

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