Isn’t it about TIME that we clear the air regarding what is meant by sola scriptura?

Question

Sola scriptura does not mean that a person ignores and rejects everything that has ever been written, except the Bible.

But it does mean that a person can rightly declare that anything written by a person that contradicts the Bible is wrong.

Furthermore, it means that anything written by a person that does not contradict the Bible may or may not be true, but we don’t accept it as the absolute infallible Word of God.

We gain immeasurable blessing from all the church fathers, saints, and others who wrote about the Bible, to teach us and edify us.

The Catholics have their list, and the Protestants have this same list plus numerous others. But no Christian was infallible in their doctrine and teaching, so we don't accept any other person's writings as we do the Bible.

Neither St. Augustine nor Martin Luther wrote infallibly, and neither do Popes. But all may write very good and true things, consistent with the Bible and Gospel, and even led by the Holy Spirit.

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We should never be so arrogant to think that we know everything and can obtain a perfect picture of God while ignoring all of the wisdom of “tradition”.

And as it is written in Job 8:8-10:
"For inquire, please, of bygone ages,
and consider what the fathers have searched out.
For we are but of yesterday and know nothing,
for our days on earth are a shadow.
Will they not teach you and tell you
and utter words out of their understanding?”

And even with the teachings of those who have come before us, we still do not “see” perfectly, as it is written in 1 Corinthians 13:12:
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”

But if we – as Christians - accept teachings that contradict the Bible, then how are we any different from any other cult or man-made religions, such as Mormonism, the Jehovah Witnesses, Hinduism, Islam, etc.?

Answer 1

Good old ROMANS32! - here we have the witness of HISTORY upon the bloody and shameful history of popery which controlled the western world for over a thousand years!

But, no, no, it's not politically correct to speak about these things, is it? We must have unity. Unity with what - a system that has murdered our brethren and chained down mankind regardless of his conscience for a milennia?

This unity is spurious, for it is only when Christians unite under THE SAME SPIRIT that they are truly in unity and - by the way - this happens every time one Christian recognises the true faith and knowledge of Christ in another.

Call me a Catholic-basher if you will, you who refuse to listen to history and to rationale, who cling onto 'the faith of our fathers' and believe every crafty thing the priests tell you. You are blind! You are bound! Out of what misguided loyalty will you insist on repeating the errors of this 'faith of our fathers'? You should ask, not, is it the 'faith of our fathers', but rather 'is it the truth?'.

'Sola Scriptura' was the cry of the Reformation. Why? - because scripture was the only witness which could be trusted. It was the only true plumbline, and the reformers recognized this.

ROMANS32 has rightly said how multitudes were murdered for their faith by the Roman system. Let me add a little of my knowledge. I read that, in the year 1519, in England's Henry VIII's time, the clerics hauled up a small group of 7 people to an ecclesiastical court (!) and condemned them for teaching their children the Apostles Creed, the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer in English. The men were burned at the stake, but the widow was spared for the children's sake, but she was later burned when a forbidden manuscript was found on her person. What was their crime? It was twofold: teaching their children themselves apart from the priest, and using forbidden manuscripts in the vernacular and not Latin.

The church had the power of life and death over people in those days and could commit someone to the fire for the least infringement of 'orthodoxy'. For centuries, this was normal, and anyone who 'bucked the system' went to a painful death.

You may have heard of what happened in France after St. Bartholomews day, August 1572, when, after an initial uprising of the Catholic populace against the Huguenots in Paris, the massacring spread throughout France and it is estimated that between 10-100,000 Huguenots were murdered. In response, Pope Gregory offered a special thanksgiving mass and a Te Deum and had a commemorative medal struck.

The above are just two examples. There is not space to go into details of England's 'Bloody Mary'.

The reformers - probably because of their knowledge of the holy scriptures and first-hand experience - all recognised the Catholic church as the Whore of Babylon of the book of Revelation. Oh yes, the Whore was easy to recognize then!

One more point. The Catholics will insist that theirs is the one-and-only, original church which came pure from the Apostles. Because the priests tell them so. I have to say that, if this is true, then I'm finished with Christianity!

This is an out and out lie and not the only 'whopper' they tell the faithful! Any person with an ounce of commonsense and some dilligent searching will see that the picture of the Early Church, in both structure, practice and beliefs, is way, way out of line with Roman Catholicism. When Christianity was born, it was pure, simple, Apostolic and founded upon the (then existing) holy scriptures and the word of Christ. It was nothing like the Roman church.

That is why the Roman clerics had the first Bibles burned, so that the common people might not learn the truth about the system which had been oppressing them and lying to them for a milennium, a system which demanded blind faith and obedience from them at every turn.

And that is why the reformers had the motto 'sola scriptura', for they knew that they dare not trust in any man's teaching, tradition or structures unless they could be clearly seen to align with the pure Word, for they had seen, in the Roman system, what such things could do.

As Christ our Lord said : 'Thy word is truth' (John 17:17).

Answer 2

Are the councils that determine the canon of the Bible infallible? If not, then how can you call the Bible infallible?

Besides, the reformers had many "solas" - scriptura, fide (faith), Christus (Christ)

If the Catholic bashers here want to focus on the sins of members of the church - fine, but two can play at that game. Jim Bakker anyone?

To say that Scripture only is the only witness to be trusted denies the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. I worship the triune God, not the Bible and I fully believe he works and speaks to us in both the Bible and other means. The Bible - even with it's perfection - can be twisted beyond recognition. Satan proves this daily. Scripture is a gift from God, but it's not His only gift - I pity those that don't see that.

Answer 3

I get a kick out of the catholic responses arguing that the Bible never claims sola scriptora. It screams it in many places. II Timothy 3:16; II Peter 1:21; II Thessalonians 2:13. It claims to be the Word of God in over 3,000 places. It an it alone is the final authority for faith and practice. NOt popes, councils, creeds or churches. It alone binds the conscience, not the word of men. Look what happens when an organization claims to have final authority and someone actually has the audacity to question a particular practice. "oh, you are questioning the church, to the stake you go." Is there a catholic out there who would argue for the torture of thousands of saints through the ages just for questioning the authority of the church. Chain the Bibles to the pulpit, keep the people ignorant. Drown those who rebaptize, burn those as heretics for speaking against the pope. Where do you find papal authority, where does the Bible say Peter was the first pope? Where do you find the sale of indulgences to get people out of purgatory? Where do you find purgatory? Where do you find praying to saints or worshipping Mary? Where do you find transubstantiation? Are these explicitly stated in Scripture?
There is nothing wrong with tradition or creeds as long as they clearly give a summation of what Scripture says.
Finally, the Bible produced the church, not the other way around. The word of the gospel brings forth the church, not the church bringing forth the gospel. The gospel was received by Paul from the revelation of Jesus Christ and was given to the churches of the New Testament. The gospel brought forth the church. I Corinthians 15:1-4. The church did not determine the canon of Scripture but merely discovered it as the Scriptures were received by the churches as it was being circulated. Obviously some took longer to be received (mostly the general epistles) it was only the texts that had the ring of apostolic authority and bore the marks of being written by the Holy Spirit which were included in the canon. A good book to read is the New Testament documents: are they reliable by FF Bruce.

Answer 4

I agree with you that we should adore the Sacred Scriptures with the highest reverence, but the fact that the bible is not the sole authority cannot be ignored. First, the bible never claims this of itself; second, the Church existed before the bible, not the other way around. One of the first letters that would later become scripture wasn't written until nearly 2 decades after Christ's death, so how did the first Christians learn the faith without written scripture?

Answer 5

I respect your opinion but I think it will take more than arguments to see the end the divisions. Look at the Anglican Church being threatened by a large schism on an issue that wouldn´t be a problem with a proper hierarchy. But people just don´t trust hierarchy - its a matter of individualism. So the result is so many divisions that in the end kids don´t get taught the basic Christian doctrines. Young people being swayed from church to church, not finding comfort in any one of them, not even knowing whom to turn to for help, because their parents wish to respect their choice. Not even knowing that there used to be anything different. They grew so much away from their mother church that they don´t even recognize it as Christianity any more but see it as a threat.

but then its important for Catholics to be ourselves and hope. I don't care about points.

Answer 6

Actually, the more I study the whole issue with Bible and Tradition, I realize that in Roman church the Bible is there to explain and guard the Tradition. For instance, Tradition says that Pope is Peter's successor. But, they don't really find this teaching in the Bible. They find it in their own Traditions, and then search for proofs of this Tradition among the Scriptures. Then they find a few isolated examples of Peter having preeminence among the Twelve, and here it is: the proof of the Pope!

The difference between the Roman church and Protestant church is that we (Protestants) believe that there were oral traditions (if we really must call them that way, since they are better be called oral revelational teaching) from apostles being handed down to NT church. But, we are talking about first source traditions, not about traditions from second, third or fourth source (what Roman church means when they speak of them, believing that God actually inspired the people who were handing them down.). Also, we believe that in God's providence - this or the other way - God made apostles and their close co-workers (prophets) to write this traditions down as infallible revelational teaching. In the same vein, God DIDN'T inspire anybody to write down this other things Roman church teaches that apostles were teaching and believing. It's good to ask why? Because all their teaching necessary for faith and godliness is in the Bible (2. Peter 1:19-21ff).

Therefore, when we want to know what apostles really thought, we don't go to traditions that are fallible and corrupted by who knows who, but try to reconstruct it from the Word!

Answer 7

the fundamental flaw with "sola scriptura" is that one can never be "sola scriptura" it is an impossible premise.

What about the translation of bible you rely upon? To be "sola scriptura" would mean there would have been no editors, publishers or copiers to rely upon also and yet miraculously the scripture is still transmitted to you ola sola. What about the original writers of the text they were merely men yet without relying upon them in copying down the actual "scriptura" you wouldn't have it.

Sola scriptura is a fallacy and it takes intellectual honesty to acknowledge it's creation was an attempt to fill the void created once first Protestants threw out the teaching authority of the first Church. What they actually did under the guise of "sola scriptura" was replace the teaching authority of the first Church with that of Luther and Calvin and Zwingli and Knox and Wesley and Darby and John MacArthur and eventually with each individual named yacha so that nobody has one faith anymore in Protestant Christianity, no one confesses one baptism anymore, and most importantly no one in Protestant Christianity professes in one Lord anymore. Just look at the development from within Protestantism of Mormonism, Jehovah Witness, Oneness Pentecostals, 7th Day Adventism, Unitarianism all of which now attack the ancient Christology.

What a right mess with all the church-hopping going on and every Protestant wanting to tailor make their own faith tradition slash confession slash belief statment or what we first Christians (Catholics) call credo.

What is being argued here is authority and rightful interpretation of God's revelation. There is also an assumption that all revelation was written down where is that ... in the bible?

Yours is the pathway to confusion brother yacha

Answer 8

Amen Brother.
We have many great teacher's/authors.
But we're warned to put trust In no man,as man Is frail & weak. Apart from God,they can do nothing of themselves.
We need to check everything written or said against the word of God.
His word Is they only Truth.
To allow even a small error,can lead you astray.
Take heed and above all guard your heart.

Answer 9

1Corinthians 3:13, "Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be REVEALED BY FIRE; and the FIRE shall try every man's work of what sort it is." (14), "If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, HE SHALL RECEIVE A REWARD." (15), "If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but HE HIMSELF SHALL BE SAVED; yet so as by fire."

Man's works, whether writings or other works, shall be tried by God's refining fire. If truth, it will withstand the fire, and the man will receive a reward, but if a lie, it will be burnt up in the fire, and man will suffer the loss and shame of it.

Answer 10

Your correct and I see your point and it is more clear, I'm glad you used the cults as a example that we would become like them in out view points!