The Bible, the Catholic church, and Protestantism.?

Question

The Bible was canonized by the group that became known as the Catholics. The non-Catholic churches stems from the Catholics. If the Protestant church from which all non-Catholic Christian denominations originated considered the Catholic Church "The Whore of Babylon", why did that Protestant church accept the Biblical cannon created by the Catholic church but only removed what it considered to be apocryphal? There were many many books that could have been re-included into the Bible for canonization minus the ones they disagreed with. Why did they, and still do to this day, take the "Whore of Babylon's" word that the rest of the books were worthy?

Andy, there is no 'holy spirit' so there was no protection of the bible which is still beside the question altogether. The fact remains that the protestants accepted the Catholic's version of the Bible only minus a few books considered apocryphal. Why would the protestant church accept "the whore of Babylon's" word on the rest?

Matt, I didn't say that the Catholics created the scripture. I said they are the ones who Canonized it. Educate yourself on that.

Daver, I suppose if I read Harry Potter then I'd know that Hogwarts exists to? A book cannot be used to support it's own assertions if it could then we must believe anything written that claims to be true.

The canonization of the New Testament

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Testament

Uncle, You don't know what you're talking about. Clearly you're one of the many Christians who do not know their Biblical history

It's far more complex than you're making it. The books were written earlier than the Catholic church existed but canonization took centuries, and was not fully decided upon till after the official founding of the Catholic church in 380 CE.

Answer 1

The New Testanment Canon that all Reformation Protestants accept was decided upon by the Catholic Church. If most Protestants accept the PhariseeCanon of the OT rather than the Alexandrian LXX one,why do they accept the NT as biblical since the Jamnian Rabbinic Tradition banned using the NT at all and rejected the NT claim to be inspired at all.?
Everybody interprets the Bible through some sort ofTradition-often a truncation of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Tradition added to by the interpretations of the founders and preachers of whatever group or denomination the individual happens to belong to or break off from.

Answer 2

Orthodox believe in purgatory, who told you they dont? LOL Orthodox accept the Pope as first amongst equals, they just question his level of authority. Immaculate Conception is a "believe or don't believe" issue in Orthodoxy, it isnt a settled issue because a council hasnt been called in almost a thousand years. filioque isnt really a big deal, mostly layman cry about it but not clergy. Well now you make no sense, which Orthodoxy are you referring to? Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy? Eastern Orthodoxy broke from the Catholic church after the great Schism and almost rejoined at the Council of Florence, but everytime a patriarch of Constantinople Became Catholic he was either murdered, dumped in prison or exiled. Christianity technically was united until the Sassanid Empire began persecuting Christians and told them to nationalize the church or be considered agents of Rome, so they broke from the Catholic church and became the Assyrian Church of the East. That's the beginning of when Christianity had an official split. Orthodox do consider protestantism to be a heresy, you clearly have been fooled by someone. Orthodox believe unless you are Orthodox or Catholic, you are going to hell. It is the Protestants who for the most part are the reasons for secularism, the Islamic invasion of the West, gay marriage, abortion.

Answer 3

With all due respect, what you present as fact, is not.
In reference to the Israelites and the putting together of the OT, Romans 3:2 says:
"They were entrusted with the sacred pronouncements of God."
The Israelites compiled the OT.
The NT was complete by the year 98 A.D.
The Catholic church came into existence circa 325 A.D.
I don't know what you mean by them 'canonizing' the Bible, but that book was complete and in circulation for over 200 years BEFORE Catholicism was established.

Answer 4

I would simply argue that it took centuries for the Catholic church to come into existence and become corrupt in practice and theology. This whole notion that Scripture was invented by Catholics is at best arrogant and at worst blasphemous. (in keeping with many of their doctrines)

We have to remember that it is GOD that created and provided Scripture throughout the history of Israel long before the Catholic Church was ever thought of.

And I think its important to remember that cannonization was merely RECOGNIZING the Scriptures the early church was ALREADY USING.

Answer 5

That's just like when the early churches tried to destroy the Gnostic Scriptures. Oh well it is what it is.

Answer 6

The catholic church didn't form until somewhere around the 3rd century.


The bible was protected by the Holy Spirit and entrusted to the disciples of Christ passed down from century to century.


"We wish to quote from a book entitled Our Authorized Version Vindicated, copyright 1930, by Benjamin G. Wilkinson, who (being a Seventh-Day Adventist) cannot be accused of being partial to us. Mr. Wilkinson wrote:

. . . down through the centuries there were only two streams of manuscripts. The first stream which carried the Received Text in Hebrew and Greek, began with the Apostolic churches, and reappearing at intervals down the Christian Era among enlightened believers, was protected by the wisdom and scholarship of the pure church in her different phases; by such as the church at Pella in Palestine where the Christians fled, when in 70 A.D. the Romans destroyed Jerusalem; by the Syrian Church of Antioch which produced eminent scholarship; by the Italic Church in northern Italy; and also at the same time by the Gallic Church in southern France and by the Celtic Church in Great Britain; by the pre-Waldensian, the Waldensian, and the churches of the Reformation. This first stream appears, with very little change, in the Protestant Bibles of many languages, and in English, in that Bible known as the King James Version, the one which has been in use for three hundred years in the English speaking world.
The second stream is a small one of a very few MSS. These last manuscripts are represented: (a) In Greek:--The Vatican MS., or Codex B, in the library at Rome; and the Sinaitic, or Codex Aleph, its brother (in the Russian Museum in Moscow). (b) In Latin:--The Vulgate or Latin Bible of Jerome. (c) In English:-- The Jesuit Bible of 1582, which later with vast changes is seen in the Douay, or Catholic Bible. (d) In English again:--In many modern Bibles which introduce practically all the Catholic readings of the Latin Vulgate which were rejected by the Protestants of the Reformation; among these, prominently, are the Revised Versions.--pp. 12, 13.

But let us see what the Waldenses believed, according to their own historian, Jean Leger. Wilkinson, page 32, says:
This noble scholar of Waldensian blood was the apostle of his people in the terrible massacres of 1655, and labored intelligently to preserve their ancient records. His book, the General History of the Evangelical Churches of the Piedmontese Valleys, published in French in 1669, and called "scarce" in 1825, is the prized object of scholarly searchers. It is my good fortune to have that very book before me. Leger, when he calls (Robert) Olivetan's French Bible of 1535 "entire and pure," says: "I say 'pure' because all the ancient exemplars, which formerly were found among the Papists, were full of falsifications, which caused Beza to say in his book on Illustrious Men, in the chapter on the Vaudois, that one must confess it was by means of the Vaudois of the Valleys that France today has the Bible in her own language. This godly man, Olivetan, in the preface of his Bible, recognizes with thanks to God, that since the time of the apostles, or their immediate successors, the torch of the gospel has been lit among the Vaudois (or the dwellers in the Valleys of the Alps, two terms which mean the same), and has never since been extinguished." --Leger, General History of the Vaudois Churches, p. 165.
Wilkinson also shows (pp. 42-43) that Erasmus recognized two parallel streams of Bibles:"

Answer 7

I don't come from Babylon, buster.

Answer 8

There is only one Bible Canon and that is the Catholic Bible Canon.

Perhaps if you actually read the Bible, you would know that the Holy Spirit exists:

The Holy Spirit is God
Job 33:4 - "The Spirit of God made me and the breath of the Almighty has given me life." Only God is the creator of life.

Matt. 12:31; Luke 12:10 - Jesus says blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. Only God can be blasphemed.

John 4:24 - God is a spirit (the Holy Spirit) and they who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth. Only God is worshiped.

John 14:16,26; 15:26; 16:7 - the Father and the Son send the Counselor, the Holy Spirit - Isaiah 9:6 - the Counselor is Mighty God.

Acts 5:3-4,9 - Peter tells Ananias that he lied to the Holy Spirit, and that he has not lied to men, but to God (the Holy Spirit).

Acts 28:25-27 - the Holy Spirit said "Go to this people and say..." - Isaiah 6:8-10 - the Lord said "Go to this people and say..."

Rom. 8:11 - the Spirit that raised Jesus up from the dead - Gal. 1:1 - God the Father raised Jesus from the dead.

1 Cor. 2:10 - the Spirit searches everything - Jer. 17:10 - the Lord searches the heart.

1 Cor. 3:16 - you are the temple of God - 1 Cor. 6:19 - you are the temple of the Holy Spirit.

1 Cor. 12:4-6 - there are varieties of gifts but the same Spirit, varieties of service but the same Lord, varieties of working but same God.

2 Cor. 3:6,17 - we are ministers of the covenant in the Spirit which gives life. Now the Lord (God) is the Spirit.

Heb. 10:16 - the Holy Spirit said this is the covenant I will make - Jer. 31:33 - the Lord said this is the covenant I will make.

1 Peter 1:2 - we are sanctified by the Holy Spirit - 1 Thess. 5:23 - the very God of peace sanctifies you wholly.

The Holy Spirit is a Person
Luke 12:12 - the Holy Spirit will teach you in that hour what you ought to say. He (the Holy Spirit) teaches the faithful.

John 14:17 - the world neither sees Him or knows Him ("Him" is referring to the Holy Spirit). You know Him for He dwells with you.

John 14:26 - the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all I have said to you.

John 15:26 - the Spirit, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness to me. He = the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a person, not a thing.

John 16:7 - if I do not go, the Counselor will not come to you. But if I go, I (Jesus) will send Him to you.

John 16:7 - this verse also proves the filioque (that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son). The Father isn’t just loving the Son; the Son is loving the Father in return, in the same Spirit of love. Therefore, the Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son.

John 16: 8 - when He (the Holy Spirit) comes, He will convince the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.

John 16:13-14 - when the Spirit of truth comes He will guide you into all truth. He will speak, He will declare and He will glorify.

Acts 8:29; 10:19-20; 11:12;13:2; Rev. 22:17 - the Holy Spirit speaks to us like a human person.

Acts 15:25,28 - it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us. The Holy Spirit, as a divine person, thinks and makes judgments.

Rom. 8:26 - the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. It is the Spirit Himself, not itself.

Rom. 8:16 - it is the Spirit Himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God. The Spirit is a person.

Rom. 15:30 - I appeal to you by the Lord Jesus and the love of the Spirit. Only persons, rational beings, can love.

1 Cor. 12:11 - the Holy Spirit apportions His gifts to each one individually as He wills. He is the third person of the Godhead.

2 Cor. 13:14 - the Holy Spirit can have fellowship with the faithful like a human person.

Eph. 4:30 - the Holy Spirit can be grieved, just as human persons can be grieved.


I can tell, from your "Whore of Babylon" remark, you are not really all that interested in what the Bible actually teaches. Your interest in the Bible is dictated by it's value as a source for anti-Catholic propaganda.

You must be a fan of D.H. If you know him, you know what those initials stand for. Might that be where you get your "Whore of Babylon theory from? Here is a portion of an article that came from catholic.com, that will set the record straight as far as your "Whore" came is concerned:


#1: Seven Hills
Hunt argues that the Whore "is a city built on seven hills," which he identifies as the seven hills of ancient Rome. This argument is based on Revelation 17:9, which states that the woman sits on seven mountains.

The Greek word in this passage is horos. Of the sixty-five occurrences of this word in the New Testament, only three are rendered "hill" by the King James Version. The remaining sixty-two are translated as "mountain" or "mount." Modern Bibles have similar ratios. If the passage states that the Whore sits on "seven mountains," it could refer to anything. Mountains are common biblical symbols, often symbolizing whole kingdoms (cf. Ps. 68:15; Dan. 2:35; Amos 4:1, 6:1; Obad. 8–21). The Whore’s seven mountains might be seven kingdoms she reigns over, or seven kingdoms with which she has something in common.

The number seven may be symbolic also, for it often represents completeness in the Bible. If so, the seven mountains might signify that the Whore reigns over all earth’s kingdoms.

Even if we accept that the word horos should be translated literally as "hill" in this passage, it still does not narrow us down to Rome. Other cities are known for having been built on seven hills as well.

Even if we grant that the reference is to Rome, which Rome are we talking about—pagan Rome or Christian Rome? As we will see, ancient, pagan Rome fits all of Hunt’s criteria as well, or better, than Rome during the Christian centuries.

Now bring in the distinction between Rome and Vatican City—the city where the Catholic Church is headquartered—and Hunt’s claim becomes less plausible. Vatican City is not built on seven hills, but only one: Vatican Hill, which is not one of the seven upon which ancient Rome was built. Those hills are on the east side of the Tiber river; Vatican Hill is on the west.


#2: "Babylon"—What’s in a Name?
Hunt notes that the Whore will be a city "known as Babylon." This is based on Revelation 17:5, which says that her name is "Babylon the Great."

The phrase "Babylon the great" (Greek: Babulon a megala) occurs five times in Revelation (14:8, 16:19, 17:5, 18:2, and 18:21). Light is shed on its meaning when one notices that Babylon is referred to as "the great city" seven times in the book (16:19, 17:18, 18:10, 16, 18, 19, 21). Other than these, there is only one reference to "the great city." That passage is 11:8, which states that the bodies of God’s two witnesses "will lie in the street of the great city, which is allegorically called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified."

"The great city" is symbolically called Sodom, a reference to Jerusalem, symbolically called "Sodom" in the Old Testament (cf. Is. 1:10; Ezek. 16:1–3, 46–56). We also know Jerusalem is the "the great city" of Revelation 11:8 because the verse says it was "where [the] Lord was crucified."

Revelation consistently speaks as if there were only one "great city" ("the great city"), suggesting that the great city of 11:8 is the same as the great city mentioned in the other seven texts—Babylon. Additional evidence for the identity of the two is the fact that both are symbolically named after great Old Testament enemies of the faith: Sodom, Egypt, and Babylon.

This suggests that Babylon the great may be Jerusalem, not Rome. Many Protestant and Catholic commentators have adopted this interpretation. On the other hand, early Church Fathers often referred to Rome as "Babylon," but every references was to pagan Rome, which martyred Christians.

#3: Commits Fornication
Hunt tells us, "The woman is called a ‘whore’ (verse 1), with whom earthly kings ‘have committed fornication’ (verse 2). Against only two cities could such a charge be made: Jerusalem and Rome."

Here Hunt admits that the prophets often referred to Jerusalem as a spiritual whore, suggesting that the Whore might be apostate Jerusalem. Ancient, pagan Rome also fits the description, since through the cult of emperor worship it also committed spiritual fornication with "the kings of the earth" (those nations it conquered).

To identify the Whore as Vatican City, Hunt interprets the fornication as alleged "unholy alliances" forged between Vatican City and other nations, but he fails to cite any reasons why the Vatican’s diplomatic relations with other nations are "unholy."

He also confuses Vatican City with the city of Rome, and he neglects the fact that pagan Rome had "unholy alliances" with the kingdoms it governed (unholy because they were built on paganism and emperor worship).

#4: Clothed in Purple and Red
Hunt states, "She [the Whore] is clothed in ‘purple and scarlet’ (verse 4), the colors of the Catholic clergy." He then cites the Catholic Encyclopedia to show that bishops wear certain purple vestments and cardinals wear certain red vestments.

Hunt ignores the obvious symbolic meaning of the colors—purple for royalty and red for the blood of Christian martyrs. Instead, he is suddenly literal in his interpretation. He understood well enough that the woman symbolizes a city and that the fornication symbolizes something other than literal sex, but now he wants to assign the colors a literal, earthly fulfillment in a few vestments of certain Catholic clergy.

Purple and red are not the dominant colors of Catholic clerical vestments. White is. All priests wear white (including bishops and cardinals when they are saying Mass)—even the pope does so.

The purple and scarlet of the Whore are contrasted with the white of the New Jerusalem, the Bride of Christ (Rev. 19:8). This is a problem for Hunt for three reasons: (a) we have already noted that the dominant color of Catholic clerical vestments is white, which would identify them with New Jerusalem if the color is taken literally; (b) the clothing of the Bride is given a symbolic interpretation ("the righteous acts of the saints;" 19:8); implying that the clothing of the Whore should also be given a symbolic meaning; and (c) the identification of the Bride as New Jerusalem (Rev. 3:12, 21:2, 10) suggests that the Whore may be old (apostate) Jerusalem—a contrast used elsewhere in Scripture (Gal. 4:25–26).

Hunt ignores the liturgical meaning of purple and red in Catholic symbolism. Purple symbolizes repentance, and red honors the blood of Christ and the Christian martyrs.

It is appropriate for Catholic clerics to wear purple and scarlet, if for no other reason because they have been liturgical colors of the true religion since ancient Israel.

Hunt neglects to remind his readers that God commanded that scarlet yarn and wool be used in liturgical ceremonies (Lev. 14:4, 6, 49–52; Num. 19:6), and that God commanded that the priests’ vestments be made with purple and scarlet yarn (Ex. 28:4–8, 15, 33, 39:1–8, 24, 29).

#5: Possesses Great Wealth
Hunt states, "[The Whore’s] incredible wealth next caught John’s eye. She was ‘decked with gold and precious stones and pearls . . . ’ [Rev. 17:4]." The problem is that, regardless of what it had in the past, the modern Vatican is not fantastically wealthy. In fact, it has run a budget deficit in most recent years and has an annual budget only around the size of that of the Archdiocese of Chicago. Furthermore, wealth was much more in character with pagan Rome or apostate Jerusalem, both key economic centers.


#6: A Golden Cup
Hunt states that the Whore "has ‘a golden cup [chalice] in her hand, full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication.’" This is another reference to Revelation 17:4. Then he states that the "Church is known for its many thousands of gold chalices around the world."

To make the Whore’s gold cup suggestive of the Eucharistic chalice, Hunt inserts the word "chalice" in square brackets, though the Greek word here is the ordinary word for cup (potarion), which appears thirty-three times in the New Testament and is always translated "cup."

He ignores the fact that the Catholic chalice is used in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper—a ritual commanded by Christ (Luke 22:19–20; 1 Cor. 11:24–25); he ignores the fact that the majority of Eucharistic chalices Catholics use are not made out of gold, but other materials, such as brass, silver, glass, and even earthenware; he ignores the fact that gold liturgical vessels and utensils have been part of the true religion ever since ancient Israel—again at the command of God (Ex. 25:38–40, 37:23–24; Num. 31:50–51; 2 Chr. 24:14); and he again uses a literal interpretation, according to which the Whore’s cup is not a single symbol applying to the city of Rome, but a collection of many literal cups used in cities throughout the world. But Revelation tells us that it’s the cup of God’s wrath that is given to the Whore (Rev. 14:10; cf. Rev. 18:6). This has nothing to do with Eucharistic chalices.


#7: The Mother of Harlots
Now for Hunt’s most hilarious argument: "John’s attention is next drawn to the inscription on the woman’s forehead: ‘THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH’ (verse 5, [Hunt’s emphasis]). Sadly enough, the Roman Catholic Church fits that description as precisely as she fits the others. Much of the cause is due to the unbiblical doctrine of priestly celibacy," which has "made sinners of the clergy and harlots out of those with whom they secretly cohabit."

Priestly celibacy is not a doctrine but a discipline—a discipline in the Latin Rite of the Church—and even this rite has not always been mandatory. This discipline can scarcely be unbiblical, since Hunt himself says, "The great apostle Paul was a celibate and recommended that life to others who wanted to devote themselves fully to serving Christ."

Hunt has again lurched to an absurdly literal interpretation. He should interpret the harlotry of the Whore’s daughters as the same as their mother’s, which is why she is called their mother in the first place. This would make it spiritual or political fornication or the persecution of Christian martyrs (cf. 17:2, 6, 18:6). Instead, Hunt gives the interpretation of the daughters as literal, earthly prostitutes committing literal, earthly fornication.

If Hunt did not have a fixation on the King James Version, he would notice another point that identifies the daughters’ harlotries with that of their mother: The same Greek word (porna) is used for both mother and daughters. The King James Version translates this word as "whore" whenever it refers to the mother, but as "harlot" when it refers to the daughters. Modern translations render it consistently. John sees the "great harlot" (17:1, 15, 16, 19:2) who is "the mother of harlots" (17:5). The harlotries of the daughters must be the same as the mother’s, which Hunt admits is not literal sex!


#8: Sheds the Blood of Saints
Hunt states, "John next notices that the woman is drunk—not with alcohol but with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus . . . [cf. verse 6]." He then advances charges of brutality and killing by the Inquisitions, supposed forced conversions of nations, and even the Nazi holocaust!

This section of the book abounds with historical errors, not the least of which is his implication that the Church endorses the forced conversion of nations. The Church emphatically does not do so. It has condemned forced conversions as early as the third century (before then they were scarcely even possible), and has formally condemned them on repeated occasions, as in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC 160, 1738, 1782, 2106–7).

But pagan Rome and apostate Jerusalem do fit the description of a city drunk with the blood of saints and the martyrs of Jesus. And since they were notorious persecutors of Christians, the original audience would have automatically thought of one of these two as the city that persecutes Christians, not an undreamed-of Christian Rome that was centuries in the future.


#9: Reigns over Kings
For his last argument, Hunt states, "Finally, the angel reveals that the woman ‘is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth’ (verse 18). Is there such a city? Yes, and again only one: Vatican City."

This is a joke. Vatican City has no power over other nations; it certainly does not reign over them. In fact, the Vatican’s very existence has been threatened in the past two centuries by Italian nationalism.

Hunt appeals to power the popes once had over Christian political rulers (neglecting the fact that this was always a limited authority, by the popes’ own admission), but at that time there was no Vatican City. The Vatican only became a separate city in 1929, when the Holy See and Italy signed the Lateran Treaty.

Hunt seems to understand this passage to be talking about Vatican City, since the modern city of Rome is only a very minor political force. If the reign is a literal, political one, then pagan Rome fulfills the requirement far better than Christian Rome ever did.