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Tuesday, November 14, 2023

Sola Scriptura And The Departure Passages

We've written a lot about sola scriptura over the years. See the relevant posts linked here, for example. I've argued that sola scriptura can be justified by a process of elimination, much as we eventually become dependent on written sources in other contexts with the passing of time (e.g., we don't depend on ongoing oral traditions about what individuals like Josephus and Irenaeus taught). But I've cited another line of evidence that I want to highlight here. I've usually brought it up in the context of discussing the papacy, but it's relevant to sola scriptura as well. I'll quote what I wrote about it in a post last year, then expand on what I said there:

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.

The fact that a few different apostles are addressing these issues in so many contexts is significant. There's a cumulative effect.

It's probably not just a coincidence that so much emphasis on scripture, including the material most cited by Protestants, is found in the documents I'm focused on here (John 14:26, 2 Timothy 3:15-17, 2 Peter 1:20-21, 3:1-2, 3:15-16, Revelation 22:18-19, etc.).

And keep in mind that critics of sola scriptura, like Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox, have taken so much initiative to tell us how important it allegedly is to have guidance from an infallible church or Pope, to have a higher form of ecclesiology like what they offer to produce a certain type of unity they claim we should have, etc. They can't tell us how important such things supposedly are, then turn around and say that it isn't problematic for their position when the earliest sources keep bringing up other sources of authority, but don't even mention the Roman bishopric, let alone refer to a papal office, say nothing of looking to an infallible church after the apostles have departed, etc. You could still argue that other factors outweigh this consideration I'm mentioning, but the point I'm making is that it is a consideration that weighs against systems like Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy to some extent.

2 comments:

  1. they show no awareness of anything like a papacy or infallible magisterium.

    Yes, which is just one of the distinctive Catholic teachings which are not manifest in the only wholly inspired substantive authoritative record of what the NT church believed (which is Scripture, in particular Acts through Revelation, which best shows how the NT church understood the gospels).

    As for SS, Scripture prima is indisputable, and thus the sufficiency claim is what needs the most attention. Which requires disabusing the strawman of SS typically repeated by Catholics, even though their oral tradition claim is spurious. For while men such as the apostles could speak as wholly inspired of God and also provide new public revelation thereby (in conflation with what had been written), neither popes and councils do not and cannot claim to do. Thus the written word is the assured infallible word of God.

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  2. Thus here are questions for those who argue for the alternative of sola scriptura, which is that of sola ecclesia:
    1. What is God's manifest most reliable permanent means of preserving the word of God: oral transmission or writing?
    2. What became the established supreme substantive authoritative source for testing Truth claims: oral transmission or Scripture?
    3. Which came first: an authoritative body of wholly God-inspired writings of the word of God, or the NT church, and which provided the transcendent prophetic, doctrinal and moral foundation for the NT church?
    4. Did the establishment of a body of wholly God-inspired authoritative writings by the first century require an infallible magisterium?
    5. Which transcendent sure, substantive source was so abundantly invoked by the Lord Jesus and NT church in substantiating Truth claims to a nation which was the historical instruments and stewards of express Divine revelation: oral transmission or writing?
    6. Was the veracity of Scripture ever subject to testing by the oral words of men, or vice versa?
    7. Do Catholic popes and councils speak or write as wholly inspired of God in giving His word like as men such as apostles could and did, and also provide new public revelation thereby?
    8. In the light of the above, do you deny that only Scripture is the transcendent, supreme, wholly inspired-of-God substantive and authoritative word of God, and the most reliable record and supreme source for what the NT church believed?
    9. Do you think sola scriptura must mean that only the Bible is to be used in understanding what God says, and means that all believers will correctly understand what is necessary, and that it replaces the magisterial office (and ideally a centralized one) as the formal judicial earthly authority on matters of dispute (though it appeals to Scripture as the only infallible and supreme substantive source of Divine Truth)?
    10. Do you think the sufficiency aspect of sola scripture must mean that the Bible explicitly and formally provides everything needed for salvation and growth in grace, including reason, writing, ability to discern, teachers, synods, etc. or that this sufficiency refers to Scripture as regards it being express Divine public revelation, and which formally and materially (combined) provides what is necessary for salvation and growth in grace, as the sole sure, supreme, standard of express Divine public revelation?
    11. What infallible oral magisterial source has spoken to man as the wholly God-inspired public word of God outside Scripture since the last book was penned?
    12. Where in Scripture is a magisterium of men promised ensured perpetual infallibility of office whenever it defines as a body a matter of faith or morals for the whole church?
    13. Does being the historical instruments, discerners and stewards of express Divine revelation mean that such possess that magisterial infallibility?
    14. What is the basis for your assurance that your church is the one true apostolic church? The weight of evidence for it or because the church who declared it asserts she it cannot err in such a matter?

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