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Source: (consider it) Thread: Eccles: Liturgy as performance
South Coast Kevin
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It just seems such a flimsy basis for the delineation of the people of God into priests and non-priests. Given there is evidently some dispute as to what Romans 15:16 is getting at, I think we must look at what other use the word 'priest' and its cognates are put to in the New Testament.

Nowhere else are specific Christians identified as priests with the corresponding implication that other Christians are not priests (correct me if I'm wrong). Obviously the Gospels are full of references to Jewish priests, and Hebrews also refers to Jesus as our great High Priest.

I think that just leaves 1 Peter 2, where it seems clear to me that all of Christ's followers are described as a holy and royal priesthood. Sure, our roles are different but I see no justification to describe some Christians as priests and others not.

EDIT - Leaders in the early Christian movement were described using those words which had common, everyday meanings - 'older man', 'overseer', 'ambassador', 'servant'. It's striking to me that no Christians were explicitly called 'priest'; I can't believe that this was just an accident.

[ 24. April 2014, 16:36: Message edited by: South Coast Kevin ]

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
It just seems such a flimsy basis for the delineation of the people of God into priests and non-priests.

I haven’t said that other Christians are non-priests. We are all priests, if we are baptised. But some have a priesthood of another character. And that is the bishops, presbyters, and deacons.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
I think that just leaves 1 Peter 2, where it seems clear to me that all of Christ's followers are described as a holy and royal priesthood. Sure, our roles are different but I see no justification to describe some Christians as priests and others not.

Which I haven’t. I have only said that some people have a priesthood of another character.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
EDIT - Leaders in the early Christian movement were described using those words which had common, everyday meanings - 'older man', 'overseer', 'ambassador', 'servant'. It's striking to me that no Christians were explicitly called 'priest'; I can't believe that this was just an accident.

The Jewish elders were men of authority. As were elders everywhere. But this word has nothing to do with age. Timothy was an ‘elder.’

But you are still wrong on your point that “no Christians were explicitly called 'priest'.” Paul calls himself that. It doesn’t matter that he used a participle instead of a noun. If I said “I manage this store,” that would mean that I was store manager, even though I used a verb and not a noun.

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Steve Langton
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by k-mann;
quote:
We are all priests, if we are baptised.
In the context of a Baptist/Anabaptist Church, with credobaptism, I would totally agree. But in churches which baptise infants, babes-in-arms, who in adulthood may show no personal faith at all, as priests?????????

by k-mann;
quote:
But some have a priesthood of another character. And that is the bishops, presbyters, and deacons.
That may be the position of Lutheranism; whether it's the position of the NT might be a different matter. 'Deacons' are not a junior grade of clergy in the NT - though like my namesake Stephen and his colleague Philip they may well be competent in the spiritual field as well - but are people appointed as in effect business managers for the Church, particularly in charity affairs, to enable initially the Apostles and later the elders get on with their major job of evangelism, teaching and pastoring.

'Elders' and 'Bishops' are clearly in the NT just different words for the same thing - one word indicating the maturity needed for the office rather than Senior Citizen age, the other describing the job as 'overseeing/managing'. Neither 'presbyter/bishop' nor 'deacon' are described in the NT as 'priests' as such. Therefore I see no reason to describe them as priests in a special sense. What exactly - EXACTLY - is this special character?

by k-mann;
quote:
But you are still wrong on your point that “no Christians were explicitly called 'priest'.” Paul calls himself that. It doesn’t matter that he used a participle instead of a noun. If I said “I manage this store,” that would mean that I was store manager, even though I used a verb and not a noun.
I'm not sure it's that simple. Paul seems to use the word in a context of mission, that is metaphorically rather than of an OT-style priesthood. I'm not good enough at Greek to be sure whether by 'offering of the Gentiles' he means that he through evangelism is offering his Gentile converts to God, or he means that as a result of his evangelism the Gentiles will make offerings, including of themselves, in relation to which he could be described as a kind of priest/intermediary. But either way this is (a)a somewhat unusual use of the 'priest' concept, and (b) does not seem to be a priesthood specific to Paul or to a priestly caste in the Church, but a kind of 'priesthood' in which any believer might be involved.

Also I wonder, as I think South Coast Kevin does, whether Paul is using the word strictly to mean 'acting as a priest' - he could arguably be using 'hierourgeo' to simply mean doing a sacred work??

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Dubious Thomas
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I'm not sure it's that simple. Paul seems to use the word in a context of mission, that is metaphorically rather than of an OT-style priesthood....

For what it's worth....

Neil Elliott, in the latest edition of the New Oxford Annotated Bible, writes on Romans 15:16: "Paul will present a holy offering to God, i.e., the Gentile believers themselves" (pg. 1996). The larger context (see, e.g., verses 18-19) supports this interpretation: Paul emphasizes that his "job" is to win the gentiles to Christ by proclaiming the gospel to them; so, that is his "offering."

For those who might find it helpful, here is the Greek Text Analysis and Translation of the verse.

Note that Paul does not identify himself as a "priest." He calls himself a λειτουργὸν (leitourgon), "minister," whose particular service in this specific case is "priestly" (or, simply, "sacred"), because it involves making an "offering" (προσφορὰ prosphora).

The usage has to be metaphorical, because the gentiles are not literally offered to God!

So, Steve Langton, I agree with you and South Coast Kevin on the specific point about Romans 15:16, and I think k-mann is making far too much of a single verbal usage.

What's notable is that the simple noun "priest" (hiereus ἱερεύς) is never, ever used to designate Christian leaders, and is conspicuous in its absence from places where, if k-mann and others are right, we should expect it to appear; e.g., Ephesians 4:11-12.

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Dubious Thomas
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
In the context of a Baptist/Anabaptist Church, with credobaptism, I would totally agree. But in churches which baptise infants, babes-in-arms, who in adulthood may show no personal faith at all, as priests?????????

This is an interesting question. Those of us who hold a high sacramental view of baptism (which we regard as fully in line with scriptural teaching), see it as bringing about a real and permanent effect on the person baptized. So, I would answer, "Yes." A babe-in-arms, newly baptized, is a baby Christian priest (just as an ancient Aaronide baby was a kohen from the moment of his birth). Of course, it is possible for such a priest to fail to fulfill his/her duties and obligations as a priest, but he/she is still a "priest" ... but a bad one!

In the Episcopal Church (United States), our 1979 Prayer Book baptismal rite includes these words: "...you are sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ's own for ever." And when the congregation welcomes the newly baptized, including babies, we say, "We receive you into the household of God. Confess the faith of Christ crucified, proclaim his resurrection, and share with us in his eternal priesthood." Clearly, it is a call and invitation to the baptized to live into the identity given at baptism.

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שפך חמתך אל־הגוים אשר לא־ידעוך
Psalm 79:6

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I'm not sure it's that simple. Paul seems to use the word in a context of mission, that is metaphorically rather than of an OT-style priesthood.

And what is mission? Is it not mission to administer the Eucharist? And I think it is interesting that it has to be metaphorical. Why is that? Isn’t this rather a fulfilment of the prophecy in Isaiah 66:17-21:

quote:
17 “Those who sanctify and purify themselves to go into the gardens, following one in the midst, eating swine’s flesh and the abomination and mice, shall come to an end together, says the Lord. 18 For I know their works and their thoughts, and I am coming to gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come and shall see my glory, 19 and I will set a sign among them. And from them I will send survivors to the nations, to Tarshish, Put, and Lud, who draw the bow, to Tubal and Javan, to the coastlands afar off, that have not heard my fame or seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the nations. 20 And they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as an offering to the Lord, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon dromedaries, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, says the Lord, just as the Israelites bring their cereal offering in a clean vessel to the house of the Lord. 21 And some of them also I will take for priests and for Levites, says the Lord.”
quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
The usage has to be metaphorical, because the gentiles are not literally offered to God!

They most certainly is, cf. Romans 12:1. Or do you believe that sacrifice necessarily involves death and destruction?

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
What's notable is that the simple noun "priest" (hiereus ἱερεύς) is never, ever used to designate Christian leaders, and is conspicuous in its absence from places where, if k-mann and others are right, we should expect it to appear; e.g., Ephesians 4:11-12.

Why, if people knew that the apostles, teachers, shepherds, etc. were sacrificial priests?

If there was a ‘corruption’ somewhere in history, when did it happen? When did the ‘simple Gospel truth’ become ‘catholicized’?

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Dubious Thomas
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I feel a bit like I'm being SHOUTED AT in type ... and that I'm SHOUTING BACK.... Maybe we could "dial it down a bit"?

Re. Isaiah 66:17-21: Do you find this prophecy referred to somewhere in the New Testament? That would be the key for knowing how to properly understand its fulfillment from a New Covenant perspective. On its own, in its natural context in Isaiah, I don't see it as relevant to the topic.

quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
The usage has to be metaphorical, because the gentiles are not literally offered to God!

They most certainly is, cf. Romans 12:1. Or do you believe that sacrifice necessarily involves death and destruction?
Romans 12:1 is also making metaphorical use of sacrificial language -- because, yes, a "real" θυσία (thusia) "necessarily involves death and destruction" (to use your words). Paul indicates that his usage is metaphorical by referring specifically to a "living sacrifice" (θυσίαν ζῶσαν thusian zosan). That combination isn't possible for the word θυσία in its "literal" sense in Koine Greek. It would be like referring to a "live roast chicken."

In any case, it's noteworthy that here Paul tells his readers to offer themselves. This makes them the priests of their own self-sacrifice. Which, of course, supports classic Lutheran doctrine about the priesthood of all the baptized.

quote:
Why, if people knew that the apostles, teachers, shepherds, etc. were sacrificial priests?
How do you know that they knew that? It looks to me like you are assuming what is actually in dispute.

The problem I have with your claim is this: You are arguing that the Apostles (all of them Jews, none of them kohanim) went about making the revolutionary claim that they, non-Aaronide Israelites, were a new order of sacrificial priests serving a new sacrificial cult (even while the Temple in Jerusalem was still standing), and that this revolutionary claim never finds clear and unambiguous mention in any of their preserved writings. I find such an argument "incredible" in the literal sense of that term = unbelievable.

So, I'm afraid I just can't accept the assumption that the audiences of the Apostolic texts "knew" that their authors were sacrificial priests. I need clear evidence that they had been told such a thing.

quote:
If there was a ‘corruption’ somewhere in history, when did it happen? When did the ‘simple Gospel truth’ become ‘catholicized’?
I don't use this kind of language to characterize the ways in which the post-Apostolic Church got off-track; so it isn't possible for me to answer your questions as you have phrased them.

I will make a point I think is important here. It seems to me that there is a problem with anachronistic interpretations of patristic texts, so that when Clement or Ignatius (for example) wrote something that "sounds" like a later, fully-developed "Catholic" doctrine, they are interpreted as actually expressing that fully-developed doctrine. I don't accept that approach to reading ideas back into the Fathers.

So, I don't myself see a need to find some kind of radical break between the New Testament texts and the early Fathers.

Still, errors and corruptions did develop, slowly and unevenly. Are you entirely denying the existence of errors and corruptions?

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שפך חמתך אל־הגוים אשר לא־ידעוך
Psalm 79:6

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South Coast Kevin
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quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I'm not sure it's that simple. Paul seems to use the word in a context of mission, that is metaphorically rather than of an OT-style priesthood.

And what is mission? Is it not mission to administer the Eucharist?
Huh? Are you saying Romans 15:16 is defining the Christian mission as being to 'administer the Eucharist'? Or do you mean the New Testament as a whole makes this point? I'm completely not following you, sorry!

My answer to the general question 'what is mission?' would probably be, at least as a starting point, that it is to make Jesus-followers of people from all nations and ethnic groups. Nothing to do with the Eucharist specifically...

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
Romans 12:1 is also making metaphorical use of sacrificial language -- because, yes, a "real" θυσία (thusia) "necessarily involves death and destruction" (to use your words). Paul indicates that his usage is metaphorical by referring specifically to a "living sacrifice" (θυσίαν ζῶσαν thusian zosan). That combination isn't possible for the word θυσία in its "literal" sense in Koine Greek. It would be like referring to a "live roast chicken."

If you are right about that, then θυσίαν ζῶσαν isn’t metaphorical, it is a logical self-contradiction, not making any more sense than ‘circular square’ or ‘rectangular triangle.’

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
In any case, it's noteworthy that here Paul tells his readers to offer themselves. This makes them the priests of their own self-sacrifice. Which, of course, supports classic Lutheran doctrine about the priesthood of all the baptized.

Which was also true in the Old Covenant.

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
How do you know that they knew that? It looks to me like you are assuming what is actually in dispute.

I do not know that, but the opposite is also not proven. But when we see the development of the early church, we see that presbyters and bishops were sacrificial priests, in a special way, by virtue of their task. Now, the Church did not stop existing suddenly, and fall completely into corruption and decay, just to be ‘saved’ by the Protestants 1300 years later.

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
The problem I have with your claim is this: You are arguing that the Apostles (all of them Jews, none of them kohanim) went about making the revolutionary claim that they, non-Aaronide Israelites, were a new order of sacrificial priests serving a new sacrificial cult (even while the Temple in Jerusalem was still standing), and that this revolutionary claim never finds clear and unambiguous mention in any of their preserved writings. I find such an argument "incredible" in the literal sense of that term = unbelievable.

(1) The priesthood of Aaron is no longer in effect. It is abolished, completed.

(2) You are of course right that this claim is not mentioned, except for the fact that Paul calls himself a priest (using a participle doesn’t change that). But when he does it it must of course be ‘metaphorical.’

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
Still, errors and corruptions did develop, slowly and unevenly. Are you entirely denying the existence of errors and corruptions?

No, but I do not see this as a corruption.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Huh? Are you saying Romans 15:16 is defining the Christian mission as being to 'administer the Eucharist'? Or do you mean the New Testament as a whole makes this point? I'm completely not following you, sorry!

My answer to the general question 'what is mission?' would probably be, at least as a starting point, that it is to make Jesus-followers of people from all nations and ethnic groups. Nothing to do with the Eucharist specifically...

Mission is to make disciples of Christ, living the Christian life, the source and summit of which is the celebration of the Eucharist, in preparation and anticipation of the heavenly banquet.

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— Paul Tillich

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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
... (1) What Christ said was “this is my body which is given for [not ‘to’] you,” which implies that it is a sacrifice. And what he commanded the Apostles to do in remembrance of him was to offer the bread in thanks and praise to God. ...

K-mann, I think you've sneaked in a non sequitur there. Nobody is disagreeing with the statements that Jesus said “this is my body which is given for [not ‘to’] you,” and "which implies that it is a sacrifice". The sacrifice is the sacrifice of Jesus, on the cross, for us. That is what the Eucharist commemorates, represents or re-presents. The Eucharist follows from the death of Christ. It is not a free-standing event of its own. Jesus did not die to bring us the Mass. The Mass is because Jesus died. Hardly anyone these days disagrees with that.

Likewise, I don't think anybody is disagreeing with the statement, "he commanded the Apostles to do in remembrance of him". This is what every ecclesial community except the Salvation Army and the Quakers does regularly.

Where the disagreement comes is with your sudden jump from there to "offer the bread in thanks and praise to God". Everyone, I think, believes that we receive "the bread in thanks and praise to God". Everyone also believes that Jesus offered himself. It's using 'offer' in the context in which you've used it that is the non sequitur. There simply is no evidence either way, as to whether notion that the bread and wine were seen as going 'upwards' as well as 'downwards' that early in the Church's journey through history.

You can say, 'this is how I understand it'. You can say, 'I find this a profoundly inspiring and helpful way to understand the Eucharist'. You can even say, 'this is like the Trinity, something the Late Antique Church developed from its understanding of the faith'. What you cannot say is that there is a fully developed doctrine of the sacrificial nature of the Mass hidden in the text of the New Testament. It just is not there. It's a question the New Testament does not answer. We don't know whether anyone had even thought of thinking in that way, that early.

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
You can say, 'this is how I understand it'. You can say, 'I find this a profoundly inspiring and helpful way to understand the Eucharist'. You can even say, 'this is like the Trinity, something the Late Antique Church developed from its understanding of the faith'. What you cannot say is that there is a fully developed doctrine of the sacrificial nature of the Mass hidden in the text of the New Testament. It just is not there. It's a question the New Testament does not answer. We don't know whether anyone had even thought of thinking in that way, that early.

I agree with that. But, as you yourself admits, the same can be said about Christology and Trinitarian Theology. Few would claim that that cannot be ‘proven’ from Scripture. And the fact of the matter is that Scripture, as every religious text ever written, must be understood not only from its immediate context, but from its use and interpretation. Scripture, like other religious texts (like, say, the Bhagavad Gita) is not like a novel. It is not ‘owned’ by its author, but exists within a community.

That community lived out its faith, and interpreted Scripture, developing, amongst other things, its Trinitarian Theology, Christology, and ‘Priestly Theology.’ Interestingly enough, much of this happened in the same eras. In the fourth and fifth century, the Church – through its councils, Fathers, liturgies, etc. – expressed what we know hold as definitive about these areas (the ‘Priestly Theology’ especially in the liturgies). And relatively simultaneously Scripture was formally canonised.

We read Scripture ‘traditionally,’ as it has been handed over.

My point is not that everyone baptised isn’t priests, but that we have different parts to our priesthood. Some of these, the deacons, presbyters, and bishops, have a different degree, if not, kind, of priesthood. We see the same thing in ancient Israel: The whole nation were priests, but some had a different task. I see the ‘Priestly Theology’ as it ‘fleshed out’ as a natural development of what we see in the New Testament.

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— Paul Tillich

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Steve Langton
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by k-mann;
quote:
That community lived out its faith, and interpreted Scripture, developing, amongst other things, its Trinitarian Theology, Christology, and ‘Priestly Theology.’ Interestingly enough, much of this happened in the same eras. In the fourth and fifth century, the Church – through its councils, Fathers, liturgies, etc. – expressed what we know hold as definitive about these areas (the ‘Priestly Theology’ especially in the liturgies). And relatively simultaneously Scripture was formally canonised.
Yes, and also over the course of the fourth century, and in pretty open defiance of the NT, the church allowed itself to become entangled with the state in a way of which we are still suffering the consequences. I don't accept the Trinity and the Christology because of the "councils, Fathers, liturgies, etc.", but because I find it in the Bible itself. And I don't accept some forms of the 'Priestly Theology' for the same reason I don't accept the 'Christian country' ideas - because I don't find them in the Bible.

SIMPLES!!!

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k-mann
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Yeah, yeah, yeah… The old 'Constantine' routine… Yawn.

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Ad Orientem
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I don't accept the Trinity and the Christology because of the "councils, Fathers, liturgies, etc.", but because I find it in the Bible itself.

Tell that to Arius.
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Gamaliel
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Nonsense, Steve Langton. You find it in the Bible itself because the Councils and compilers of the liturgies and so on found it in there first.

You don't come to the Bible neutrally nor as if the previous 2,000 years of Christianity hadn't happened.

Sure, we can find Trinitarian elements in the scriptures, but that's because we are interpreting them within a framework that is Trinitarian.

As Ad Orientem says, Arius and others have interpreted those self-same scriptures differently.

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k-mann
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Ad Orientem and Gamaliel said it better then me. I apologise for my snarky reply.

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— Paul Tillich

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Gamaliel
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I'm not having a 'go' at Steve Langton, simply pointing out something to him that he doesn't currently appear to be aware of - and which I wasn't aware of myself for many years -ie. that we don't simply get our doctrine 'from the Bible' but from the Bible as mediated/understood within the context of particular traditions and approaches.

Even when I was a Baptist I would have acknowledged that.

Forgive me, but Steve Langton seems so keen to distance himself from what he sees as the compromises and declensions of 'Constantinian Christianity' that he introduces a rather dualistic and binary distinction between that and what he himself believes in terms of Christology and the Trinity etc.

The reason that Steve Langton finds these things in the Bible is the same reason why everyone else who is Trinitarian and who holds to a high Christology does ... because he is interpreting the scriptures within the context of that particular tradition.

I happen to believe that that particular tradition is correct. The only thing that could vary is the size of the t ... whether it's small t - as in small o orthodox - or Big T as in Tradition with a capital T as espoused by the big C Catholics and the Big O Orthodox in their respective ways.

But to say, 'I believe it because it's in the Bible' begs a whole load of questions. Sure, it is in the Bible, but I can quite see how we could could up with different interpretations if we were going on a Sola (or Solo) Scriptura approach.

As Steve Langton well knows, plenty of Anabaptists and other non-conformists went down the road of Arianism and Socianism and lots of other heretical 'isms' from the 17th century onwards.

The history of the Baptists, Independents and Presbyterians is largely one of a constant pulling back from descent into outright heresy. If you read the autobiographies and biographies of some of the key figures in these movements these things crop up all the time. Heck, even the redoubtable Christmas Evans, the striking one-eyed Welsh Baptist preacher succumbed to heretical Christological views at one point in his career and only gradually found his way back to a more orthodox position.

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Baptist Trainfan
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
The history of the Baptists, Independents and Presbyterians is largely one of a constant pulling back from descent into outright heresy.

Yes, "dissent" can easily turn into "descent"!!

What the "Get back to the Bible" people fail to recognise is that (a) the original authors wrote in particular cultural contexts in which their meanings would be understood; (b) we live in a vastly different cultural situation and so read it through a different set of spectacles; (c) the translators - however well they've done their job - will have added their own "take" on the text; (d) we cannot ignore the tradition of the Church, as that would crassly ignore the wisdom of the ages. However we must not become imprisoned within that tradition: the Holy Spirit can still lead us to new and valid understandings of Scripture (and must do, as the contemporary world changes).

Quite a lot of these points also relate the way we read "secular" books as well.

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Steve Langton
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I was being a bit deliberately provocative, as indicated by my final "SIMPLES!"; nevertheless,the intention of the fourth century was actually to establish a biblical/NT position for a church which recognised the authority of the apostolic writings. With the emperor involved it would have been all too easy for the councils to go the wrong way for worldly reasons - yet the biblical version would have remained true in reality, whatever the councils said....

by Ad Orientem;
quote:
Tell that to Arius.
...Or indeed to his Jehovah's Witness successors, with whom I've spent quite a bit of time arguing in recent years, and so far always ended up finding scripture after scripture which teaches the divinity of Christ. It is perhaps worth noting that these modern Arians found it necessary to produce a new Bible translation to support their views, based upon a very dubious principle.

Nice to see you again, Gamaliel; I'll get back with further comments later - for now I need to go shopping!

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Gamaliel
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Of course there are scriptures we can cite to support Christ's Divinity. The Fathers did that too. Those supporting the o/Orthodox position against Arius did so too.

It's difficult to argue from historical 'what-ifs' but I can't see how we wouldn't all be Arians now had Arius and his supporters won the day.

Barring some kind of 'Trinitarian Reformation' at some time in subsequent history, we'd all pretty much be Arian in some way, shape or form.

I don't see any way around that.

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Gamaliel
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All that said, and this may sound inveterately 'Anglican' and middle-ground-ish, I do have a lot of sympathy with what Enoch has been posting here.

It strikes me that all of us - whether we are sacerdotally/liturgically inclined or more Anabaptist-ish - tend to read back our own position into the pages of the NT.

This came home to me very forcefully at an Orthodox conference I attended where a speaker - and most of his hearers - interpreted particular incidents in Acts in a for more sacerdotal/Church authority kind of a way than I would have - at that time - have thought possible ...

I didn't come to the exact same conclusions as the speaker, but it did make me realise that alternative interpretations of these verses/incidents - from a Baptist perspective, say, or a Pentecostal or charismatic perspective would have likewise been 'loaded' with freight and presuppositions deriving from within those respective traditions ...

We pays our money and we makes our choice ...

I'd agree that a fully-orbed priestly system of the kind we find in the RCs can't be found in chapter and verse references in the NT - but then again, why should it - unless we insist on some equally problematic Sola Scriptura position.

From a more Catholic perspective then scripture and tradition/Tradition work together in the further development of our understanding.

I wouldn't use the reference K-mann does to suggest that the Apostle Paul understood his mission in precisely the same way as RC priests do today - for instance - but at the same time I can see how Catholics can argue that their views derive from the pages of the NT - alongside the continuing teaching authority of the Church ...

I don't buy into this 'everything was wonderful in NT times and then it all fell away very rapidly' thing ... I've said as much here before, but when I first read the Sub-Apostolic Fathers I was struck - and indeed somewhat stunned - by how 'Catholic' they sounded. I wasn't expecting that at all.

Of course, I'm not suggesting that the churches in NT times were carbon copies of RC, Orthodox or Anglo-Catholic churches today - but neither were they anything like the Vineyard or contemporary Baptist, Brethren or other non-conformist congregations.

The 'raw material' is there for development in various directions - and that's what we've seen.

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Steve Langton
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by Gamaliel;
quote:
I don't buy into this 'everything was wonderful in NT times and then it all fell away very rapidly' thing ...
Nor do I, actually; I think most things changed quite slowly. Even the key change from the early 4thC toleration of the Church to the late 4thC when it became effectively compulsory took 70 years or more, and didn't affect many other important doctrines for centuries after that. Nevertheless by about the 1300s the difference between the biblical church and the medieval RC Church was clearly worrying a lot of RCs such as Erasmus, whence the result that there was the Reformation.

by Gamaliel;
quote:
The 'raw material' is there for development in various directions - and that's what we've seen.
Exactly - but the question then is, how do you distinguish good/useful developments from bad/ harmful developments; or indeed identify when an initially good idea has been taken too far and has come off the rails? Efforts to identify what you might call a 'living pope' of some kind don't seem to have been all that successful over the centuries. Going back to the apostolic starting point looks to me to be the best bet for resolving such issues.

Though it didn't 'all' fall away rapidly, it's hard to deny that even in the NT period the original teaching was under attack by rival non-apostolic teachers and by various temptations. The answer then was apostolic authority, and it still is - and that in practice means the NT, and the OT read through the new covenant which it had itself foretold.

And again by Gamaliel;
quote:
It's difficult to argue from historical 'what-ifs' but I can't see how we wouldn't all be Arians now had Arius and his supporters won the day.

Barring some kind of 'Trinitarian Reformation' at some time in subsequent history, we'd all pretty much be Arian in some way, shape or form.

I don't see any way around that.

I can see ways round it, depending on the simple fact that once you've finished the entertaining debate bit, Arianism doesn't seem to be long-term sustainable, because after rejecting Jesus' divinity it can't produce a satisfactory account of the atonement. Just for example there are justice issues in taking out our sins on an innocent third party, as a non-divine Jesus would be. Thus that the Unitarian movement remains a minority with vague and unexciting beliefs. I would guess that an Imperial Arian church would have relatively quickly collapsed and the Trinitarians would have gone on in pre-Constantine style as a (perhaps persecuted but lively) minority separate from the state. Nowadays most people would be pagans/atheists/agnostics with a minority Trinitarian church living among them - sounds familiar....
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Gamaliel
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Sure - that's a possible scenario for my 'what-if'. I'm inclined to agree that an Arian Imperial Church would have collapsed eventually but Arian forms of Christianity did persist for a while - among the Goths for instance and variations of it have continued to re-emerge - as per the wholesale apostasy in this regard of many Anabaptists, Independents and Presbyterians over the years and the often unseen and unspoken-about unitarianism of many ostensibly Trinitarian clergy and lay-people in the CofE and elsewhere.

Sure, I agree that Trinitarianism is robust and that the Truth will out, as it were ...

But one could certainly argue that the kind of Constantinianism that you feel so passionately about - for all its faults - did help to preserve these truths intact.

Christendom wasn't all bad.

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Arethosemyfeet
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quote:
Though it didn't 'all' fall away rapidly, it's hard to deny that even in the NT period the original teaching was under attack by rival non-apostolic teachers and by various temptations. The answer then was apostolic authority, and it still is - and that in practice means the NT, and the OT read through the new covenant which it had itself foretold.
That seems a lot like begging the question to me - surely it is just as valid to say that apostolic authority is determined by the apostolic succession, that the teaching of the bishops of the church meeting in ecumenical council is authoritative.
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Steve Langton
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by Gamaliel;
quote:
But one could certainly argue that the kind of Constantinianism that you feel so passionately about - for all its faults - did help to preserve these truths intact.

Christendom wasn't all bad.

Agreed; but that doesn't make the Constantinianism right any more than the eventual saving of the Israelites from famine, and their growth in Egypt up till the Exodus, made Joseph's brothers right in selling him into slavery. That God can bring good from evil never makes the evil itself good. Most of the ongoing effects of Constantinianism are bad - and it's not like you are yourself the world's biggest enthusiast for establishment, Gamaliel!

by 'arethosemyfeet';
quote:
That seems a lot like begging the question to me - surely it is just as valid to say that apostolic authority is determined by the apostolic succession, that the teaching of the bishops of the church meeting in ecumenical council is authoritative.
Hmm! That would be the bishops of the RCC - or the bishops of the Orthodox churches? And I wish you luck on getting both lots of bishops together in any near future!! And going back to the NT, are bishops that special anyway? One of the issues of the thread is that 'bishop' is biblically just another word for 'elder' - and where in the NT do elders have the kind of authority you suggest? It was loads of worldly bishops in an established church who, over centuries, produced the mess that necessitated the Reformation.... So who is really begging the question here?
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Gamaliel
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As I've said before, you pays your money and you takes your choice ...

[Biased]

I'd also suggest that there's something of a both/and rather than an either/or thing going on here ...

Protest as much as we like, none of us are free of tradition. The choice, it seems to me, is between tradition small t and Tradition Big T ... but even then there are a range of options on the Big T side ...

Be all that as it may, I think it's axiomatic that in a post-Christian society a 'gathered church' or 'intentional' model of Christian community is the way to go in terms of providing adequate 'plausibility structures' for the future - to use a sociological term.

What seems less certain to me is whether these are going to be necessarily Anabaptist in belief or practice.

That's not to say I've got anything 'against' Anabaptism - there is much to admire - it's simply that in can lead to a certain tunnel-vision and narrowness of scope - unless its informed by the more binocular vision, as it were, contained within the wider 'Grand Tradition'.

That's not to say that the heirarchical structures inherited from the past are somehow, in and of themselves, capable of preserving and transmitting the faith through any intrinsic merit of their own.

Heck, I've seen Orthodox people online rail against the Erastianism of Patriarch Kyrill, for instance.

There's certainly a case to answer with Christendom and Steve Langton does well to raise it. Where I think his argument does begin to fray is the assumption that all these nice 'born again' gathered churches are somehow going to maintain orthodoxy without reference to the grander narrative and the wider tradition. Douglas McBain the late lamented Baptist renewalist used to say that the Baptists were 'inconsistently orthodox'. That is true. They are.

I'm not saying that Baptists have to become sacramental liturgists any more than I'm saying that RCs or Orthodox have to abandon their practices and adopt a baptistic polity ...

But there's still that tension within baptistic traditions between the wholly individualistic and the sense of a communal, inherited faith. Perhaps it's possible to live with that tension ... ?

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Steve Langton
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that last has to be a cross-posting with mine; I'll wait till you've had chance to look over my own last effort.
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Arethosemyfeet
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
So who is really begging the question here?

You are, again. Whether I am as well is a moot point, as all I was saying is that the alternative view is equally supportable, and if they're both based on question begging that rather proves my point.

Nonetheless, there is plenty of evidence that the early Bishops were considered successors of the first Apostles, and there are first and second century writings that support this view. There are few, if any, that say that everything must be grounded in the books that make up the New Testament.

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Gamaliel
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Sorry, I missed your post just now - must have cross posted.

I'm not saying that Christendom was 'all good' any more than you are saying that it was 'all bad.'

And yes, I'm not a big fan of Establishment. Nor am I a fan of the kind of nationalism and Erastianism that can bedevil our brothers and sisters in the Orthodox Churches nor the kind of Ultramontane Papalism that crops up from time to time in the Roman Church.

All I'm saying is that just as Christendom wasn't all bad or all good either - neither has the kind of schismatic behaviour exhibited by the various post-Reformation Protestant groups 'all good' either.

The Orthodox would argue that rather than having a Reformation, the Protestants should have turned to them ...

But that was never going to happen - as the fascinating correspondence between Melanchthon and the Ecumenical Patriarch illustrates.

I've known RC priests argue that the great abuses that the Protestants were - rightly - protesting about were all done away with through the Counter-Reformation and therefore, in the grand scheme of things, the Reformation did them a favour too - for all its otherwise tragic consequences.

I'm simply saying that it was never clear cut and there were rights and wrongs on both sides. Nobody comes out of any of this smelling of roses, not the RCs, not the Lutherans or Calvinists, not the Anabaptists ... and I'm not just thinking of the Munster fanatics here.

I've got a lot of time for Baptists and the Baptist tradition but for various reasons I feel I've 'moved on' from it to a certain extent - which isn't to say that I'd disparage them or avoid them in any way. They've highlighted - and continue to highlight - aspects that the rest of us would do well to heed.

But theirs isn't the last word on the matter ...

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Gamaliel
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Arethosemyfeet is right - whilst the Sub-Apostolic Fathers and so on do quote the NT scriptures, they also quote material that we wouldn't regard as canonical. For them, the authority clearly came from some notion of apostolic succession.

This shocked me when I first realised that and it continues to shock me ...

But at a time before there was universal consensus on which books constituted what we now know as the NT, what other way would there have been to determine who was 'kosher' and who wasn't?

People were citing all kinds of writings - Gnostic, canonical, quasi-canonical all kinds ...

Orthodoxy was only gradually defined in opposition to error. And yes, it was with reference to accepted and authoritative texts - but it was also with reference to what was seen as 'valid' ministry around an accepted body of belief.

This happens everywhere. Heck, even in the 'loosest' Anabaptist settings any old Tom, Dick or Harry couldn't turn up and preach - they'd have to be 'recognised' in some way and however that is done it would surely be on the basis of some kind of collective agreement on who should or shouldn't be seen as having the right credentials ...

All we are talking about with the development of bishops is a kind of translocal development that occurs in all churches - whether Big C or small c.

In the 17th and 18th centuries many Baptist churches had 'messengers' who had a cross-congregational or connexional role. The restorationist 'new churches' of the 1970s onwards had their 'apostles' - essentially bishops ...

Anyway, this is getting further away from the liturgy as performance thing ...

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Steve Langton
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by Gamaliel;
quote:
All we are talking about with the development of bishops is a kind of translocal development that occurs in all churches - whether Big C or small c.

In the 17th and 18th centuries many Baptist churches had 'messengers' who had a cross-congregational or connexional role. The restorationist 'new churches' of the 1970s onwards had their 'apostles' - essentially bishops ...

I've no problem with developing practical organisational stuff, and indeed I think that's what the 'apostolic succession' originally was, for the kind of reasons you suggest. Turning that into a quasi-magical passing of authority from individual to individual when the original apostolic NT is freely available is taking an originally practical idea too far.

I agree we've somehow gone way beyond 'liturgy as performance' - or then again have we, because how church leaders are thought of is quite important to 'liturgy'.

by Gamaliel;
quote:
But there's still that tension within baptistic traditions between the wholly individualistic and the sense of a communal, inherited faith. Perhaps it's possible to live with that tension ... ?
If we take Jesus seriously about the need to be 'born again' then strictly speaking faith can't be 'inherited', nor can it be 'communal' in the way that 'establishment' implies. In my experience Anabaptists are very aware of the risks of individualism and very keen on building community among the born again - more so than Baptists. But the basic tension has to be lived with by anyone taking the gospel seriously, not just in the baptistic tradition.
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Steve Langton
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I'm not wanting this to turn into a general thread about Anabaptism (as opposed to my specific questions about the nature of priesthood and liturgy), but Yes, Anabaptists have faults - and as is often the case, the faults are quite closely related to the virtues. That is, we have that kind of fault because of the kind of good insight we also have.

Thing is, every church is currently unbalanced by our overall disunity. Consider this thought - a major part of the disunity is precisely all the churches still entangled with the state, which I submit is clearly a fault, indeed a sin. But that fault is related to considerable good on that side, good attitudes and visions which have a genuine place in the wider church - but which also make 'establishment etc.' look tempting. IF those currently in established churches could disentangle themselves from that, but bring to the rest of us the good side of that vision, we'd have a more balanced church overall....

I've long thought, indeed, that the unbalance of the more exclusive types - the Exclusive Brethren here and the more extreme among Amish and Mennonites - arises quite a bit from how hard it is to keep the balance of being PROPERLY separate from 'the world', as the NT DOES teach, when the said world purports to be 'Christian' but of course is a distorted version.

Anabaptists do not necessarily ignore the wider tradition; as I've mentioned in another thread, two of my friends in the local Anabaptist study group (which is pretty ecumenical anyway) have been writing the latest of the 'After Christendom' book series - and they are quoting Augustine, Aquinas, and a very wide range of authors from various traditions.

Come and join us and help restore our balance...?

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I've no problem with developing practical organisational stuff, and indeed I think that's what the 'apostolic succession' originally was, for the kind of reasons you suggest. Turning that into a quasi-magical passing of authority from individual to individual when the original apostolic NT is freely available is taking an originally practical idea too far.

But you are making some assumptions here; that Scripture is 'available,' that it is clear and easy to understand, and that your reading of it isn't as 'biased' as everyone else's. You read Scripture as an Anabaptist. You do not read it 'free.' Nor does anyone else. The question then becomes one of history, of Tradition, of ecclesiology, and of authority. Why should we read Scripture as an Anabaptist, when they, or anyone like them, didn't exist until the high or late Middle Ages at the earliest?

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
If we take Jesus seriously about the need to be 'born again' then strictly speaking faith can't be 'inherited', nor can it be 'communal' in the way that 'establishment' implies.

I couldn't disagree more. Religion is by essence communal. We are saved as a people, not as individuals.

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— Paul Tillich

Katolikken

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Steve Langton
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I'm currently trying to work out a comprehensive response to several different things that recent posts have chucked at me. Meanwhile, to be going on with, just one point...

by k-mann;
quote:
I couldn't disagree more. Religion is by essence communal. We are saved as a people, not as individuals.
Again, this is precisely what is at issue; IS 'religion' communal? Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit. In Christianity it is no longer possible to say "We have Abraham for our father" or some equivalent - it is necessary to be personally reconciled to God through faith in Jesus. The born again are then built into a new kind of community, international in nature and 'coming out and being separate' from the non-believers around them.

The other idea of community salvation is to be seen in places like Northern Ireland where supposedly 'Protestant' and 'Catholic' communities behave in a seriously un-Christlike way despite their profession of Christian belief - their 'religion' is communal ... but Christian, not much!

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Gamaliel
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Why don't you come and join the rest of us and help us restore our balance ...

[Biased]

You see, these things cut both ways.

You say that ecclesiastical links with the state are inherently sinful. Others could argue that schism is inherently sinful.

We simply end up going round in circles.

I think everyone would agree that an overly Erastian approach causes difficulties - we can all cite examples of that from Henry VIII to Ivan the Terrible ...

And even those Christian confessions that tend to emphasise the communal over the individualistic would still see the need for the exercise of personal faith - but the exercise of personal faith in a communal context.

It's just how tightly we want to stretch things - in either direction.

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Again, this is precisely what is at issue; IS 'religion' communal?

Yes, it is. One big indication of this is that in the only prayer ever given to us by Christ, there isn’t a single singular pronoun.

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit.

This only shows that you have no knowledge of Judaism at all.

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
In Christianity it is no longer possible to say "We have Abraham for our father" or some equivalent - it is necessary to be personally reconciled to God through faith in Jesus. The born again are then built into a new kind of community, international in nature and 'coming out and being separate' from the non-believers around them.

So, what you are saying is that a Christian shouldn’t use terms like ‘our father Abraham,’ ‘Abraham, our forefather’ or ‘Abraham our father,’ that people of faith are ‘the sons of Abraham,’ or that Abraham is ‘the father of us all,’ or any equivalents of this?

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
The other idea of community salvation is to be seen in places like Northern Ireland where supposedly 'Protestant' and 'Catholic' communities behave in a seriously un-Christlike way despite their profession of Christian belief - their 'religion' is communal ... but Christian, not much!

That is a non sequitur if I’ve ever seen one.

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— Paul Tillich

Katolikken

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Steve Langton
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by Gamaliel;
quote:
You say that ecclesiastical links with the state are inherently sinful. Others could argue that schism is inherently sinful.
Both, of course, are sinful. But put it this way, the ecclesiastical links with the state are straight-up disobedience to God - understandable how it happened originally, in a messy way which didn't seem wrong at first, but after 1600 years the wrong is pretty obvious and the need to correct the wrong also pretty obvious.

Separating from a body that is engaging in such disobedience - is that schism? After all, continuing to be connected with such a body, is to join in their sin. Which we're not really meant to do, are we???

I'll leave you to think on that one....

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
But put it this way, the ecclesiastical links with the state are straight-up disobedience to God.

I'm not saying that I necessarily disagree with you. I want my own denomination, the Church of Norway, to be free from its ties to the state, but this claim needs to be backed by actual evidence.

--------------------
"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich

Katolikken

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Steve Langton
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In what follows, k-mann, please note that I 'borrowed' the word 'communal' from a post by Gamaliel - I'm fairly sure he understands the way I'm using it, in a discussion he and I have been having for a while - you may not quite be understanding it the same...

by k-mann;

quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Again, this is precisely what is at issue; IS 'religion' communal?

K-mann response;
Yes, it is. One big indication of this is that in the only prayer ever given to us by Christ, there isn’t a single singular pronoun.

OK, rephrase to "in what way is religion communal, and in what ways not?" As I pointed out during my post, the 'born again' form a community; but as I also pointed out, that's a community separate from the surrounding society - the community of the born again cannot simply be identified with the state in which they live. Of course they pray 'our Father' and pray in 'we' terms; but equally those who haven't been born again but are only nominal Christians as citizens of a so-called 'Christian country' are not really included in that.

also by k-mann;
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit.

k-mann response;
This only shows that you have no knowledge of Judaism at all.

In the kind of terms we are using here - "The old 'Constantine' routine… Yawn." - pagan and Jewish religion (and Islam as well, with its concept of the 'Umma' and Sharia law) are 'communal' in ways that biblical born again Christianity isn't. State Christianity is often 'communal' in the pagan/Jewish/Islamic way rather than the born-again-Christian way.

again by k-mann;
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
In Christianity it is no longer possible to say "We have Abraham for our father" or some equivalent - it is necessary to be personally reconciled to God through faith in Jesus. The born again are then built into a new kind of community, international in nature and 'coming out and being separate' from the non-believers around them.

k-mann response;
So, what you are saying is that a Christian shouldn’t use terms like ‘our father Abraham,’ ‘Abraham, our forefather’ or ‘Abraham our father,’ that people of faith are ‘the sons of Abraham,’ or that Abraham is ‘the father of us all,’ or any equivalents of this?

You are making terribly heavy weather of this. My reference is to passages like;
quote:
"And do not think you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.
Matt 3:9 (NIV)

where Jews were relying on their place as ethnic Jews descended from Abraham, rather than on personal faith, for their salvation. That is, they were relying on a (questionable) form of 'communal' religion, as John the Baptist saw and challenged them. Of course the born-again, under the new covenant, are a body in continuity with the OT people of God, Gentiles joint-heirs with the Jews by grace, and able to claim Abraham as a father in that somewhat different sense.

and finally by k-mann;
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
The other idea of community salvation is to be seen in places like Northern Ireland where supposedly 'Protestant' and 'Catholic' communities behave in a seriously un-Christlike way despite their profession of Christian belief - their 'religion' is communal ... but Christian, not much!

k-mann in response;
That is a non sequitur if I’ve ever seen one.

Again I suspect Gamaliel as a fellow UK citizen more aware of things in NI is 'getting' this in ways you aren't quite. Having been dealing with the NI version of this issue since the late 60s, I don't find it a non-sequitur at all. I don't think Norway has had the kind of conflict seen in NI to give Norwegians an appreciation of that kind of 'communal religion'.
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Steve Langton
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sorry, k-mann; missed your post at 22;52 while composing my own previous. I don't think I'll be posting further tonight, but will try to answer tomorrow.
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Dubious Thomas
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quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit.

This only shows that you have no knowledge of Judaism at all.
As someone with more than a little knowledge of Judaism, I have to ask: Precisely how is it that you judge Steve Langton's statement to show that he has "no knowledge of Judaism at all"?

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שפך חמתך אל־הגוים אשר לא־ידעוך
Psalm 79:6

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Gamaliel
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Ok, Steve Langton, I'll leave you this little thought ...

If we attach ourselves to any community we share both its strengths and weaknesses, it's good points and bad points ...

There is no community whatsoever that is free of sinfulness, weakness and mixed motive in some way.

All of us are work-in-progress, and that applies as much to your apparently 'pure' and unsullied gathered model as it does to one which you might consider wickedly compromised ...

That's not to excuse wrong-doing or sinfulness.

But neither is it to enshrine some kind of smug, self-righteous separatism as some kind of Christian virtue.

On the communal thing, you say that the NT was freely available to all right from the outset - or have implied as much.

No it wasn't.

Most people couldn't read.

What was available was the apostolic deposit, the apostolic testimony - and where would most people have encountered that? Why, in this whacky community of faith we call the Church ...

I'm not as High Church as K-Mann and Ad Orientem, obviously, but even I can see that in the immediate generations following Christ and his disciples, as messy as it all undoubtedly was - there emerged a growing consensus as to what sound Christian teaching and doctrine was all about and where it could be found ie. among which groups of people.

Heck, part of this process and trajectory had started to take place before the NT was written down ... the Gospels were written for emerging Christian communities. The communities came first, then the written accounts ...

The way you are speaking one would get the impression that your ordinary, everyday Christian in Thessalonika or Ephesus was walking around with a Gideon's Bible or an IVP NIV concordance tucked under their arm ...

No, these things were transmitted and preserved in community and ratified and recognised in community.

Of course, you know that.

But it doesn't come across in the way you post. You post as if the scriptural record is somehow independent of the apostolic communities which continued to bear witness to the Risen Christ and who celebrated his life, death and glorious resurrection week by week in their gatherings and sought to follow His precepts and teachings in their daily lives.

Christians were 'operating' without John's Gospel until - I dunno - when? The late 1st century?

That doesn't mean that the teachings contained in the Fourth Gospel weren't circulating in some form before that point, but it does illustrate that the communal life of the Church was continuing even while the Gospels were being written.

Peter didn't had out a ready made pile of New Testaments on the Day of Pentecost.

No, what preserved and transmitted the Gospel was the testimony and practices of the early Christians - including their liturgies, of course - which may help us to focus on the OP ...

That's not to suggest that these early liturgies were as 'developed' as they later became - but they did play a vital role as we can see in the NT itself with its snatches of what might be doxologies and early Christian hymns and prayers.

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k-mann
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
You are making terribly heavy weather of this. My reference is to passages like;
quote:
"And do not think you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.
Matt 3:9 (NIV)

where Jews were relying on their place as ethnic Jews descended from Abraham, rather than on personal faith, for their salvation. That is, they were relying on a (questionable) form of 'communal' religion, as John the Baptist saw and challenged them. Of course the born-again, under the new covenant, are a body in continuity with the OT people of God, Gentiles joint-heirs with the Jews by grace, and able to claim Abraham as a father in that somewhat different sense.
You are completely misreading that verse. It is positive to be a child of Abraham. But one needs also to be commited. And there is no indication at all that John the Baptist were criticising the communal aspect of Judaism. That is something you read into the passages.

And the phrases I listed were all from the New Testament, from Acts 7:2, Rom 4:1 (to Christians in Rome), Rom 4:16 (to Christians in Rome), James 2:21, and Gal 3:7. Here Christians, talking to both Jews and other Christians, say ‘our father Abraham,’ ‘Abraham, our forefather,’ ‘Abraham our father,’ that people of faith are ‘the sons of Abraham,’ and that Abraham is ‘the father of us all.’

quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Again I suspect Gamaliel as a fellow UK citizen more aware of things in NI is 'getting' this in ways you aren't quite. Having been dealing with the NI version of this issue since the late 60s, I don't find it a non-sequitur at all. I don't think Norway has had the kind of conflict seen in NI to give Norwegians an appreciation of that kind of 'communal religion'.

This is nothing but a non sequitur. Just because some Christians who value the communal aspect of the religion are pricks, doesn’t mean that the communal aspect should be downplayed. It would make as much sense to say that Californians are evil satan worshippers because they have a ‘Church of Satan.’

quote:
Originally posted by Dubious Thomas:
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit.

This only shows that you have no knowledge of Judaism at all.
As someone with more than a little knowledge of Judaism, I have to ask: Precisely how is it that you judge Steve Langton's statement to show that he has "no knowledge of Judaism at all"?
Steve Langton has bought into the myth that Judaism was all about community, that individual acts of faith weren’t acquired. That just isn’t true, and the Old Testament is full of calls to personal ‘acts of faith.’ One who knew Judaism wouldn’t make such a claim.

--------------------
"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich

Katolikken

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Steve Langton
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by k-mann;
quote:
You are completely misreading that verse. It is positive to be a child of Abraham. But one needs also to be committed. And there is no indication at all that John the Baptist were criticising the communal aspect of Judaism. That is something you read into the passages.

And the phrases I listed were all from the New Testament, from Acts 7:2, Rom 4:1 (to Christians in Rome), Rom 4:16 (to Christians in Rome), James 2:21, and Gal 3:7. Here Christians, talking to both Jews and other Christians, say ‘our father Abraham,’ ‘Abraham, our forefather,’ ‘Abraham our father,’ that people of faith are ‘the sons of Abraham,’ and that Abraham is ‘the father of us all.’

I didn't say John was criticising the communal aspect of Judaism as such. He was criticising people who relied on their status as 'once-born' Jews and clearly because of that did not realise the need of personal repentance and faith.

And yes, I did recognise your quotes from the NT and in my response I took a positive attitude towards them - at least I thought I did. The point remains that 'established' religions are subject to a temptation to interpret their communal religion in the way that John criticised, and that the Christian teaching on being 'born again' implies a different kind of community - a community 'called out' from among surrounding pagans, through INDIVIDUAL faith but very much INTO A COMMUNITY. I very much understand the continuity of Christianity with Judaism - but also the inevitable difference as the gospel both is taken beyond the Jewish nation and challenges the Jewish hearers to a new covenant commitment as prophesied by Jeremiah.

by k-mann;
quote:
Just because some Christians who value the communal aspect of the religion are pricks, doesn’t mean that the communal aspect should be downplayed. It would make as much sense to say that Californians are evil Satan worshippers because they have a ‘Church of Satan.’
I'm not downplaying the communal aspect of Christianity - but I'm pointing out that the 'Christian country' is not a legitimate expression of that communality. I do not criticise NI as a whole because of the faults of some groups; I criticise the way that 'Christian country' assumptions lead to unChristian activity even by people who I do, as it happens, recognise as Christians, and also to people being able to assume they are Christian by birth in a particular community rather than by real faith. Again, very much like the Jews John criticised.

by k-mann;
quote:
Steve Langton has bought into the myth that Judaism was all about community, that individual acts of faith weren’t acquired. That just isn’t true, and the Old Testament is full of calls to personal ‘acts of faith.’ One who knew Judaism wouldn’t make such a claim.
No I have not 'bought into' that myth; I have simply recognised, as the OT and NT also do, that as a national religion, there was always a tension in Judaism between the kind of assumption John criticised as against the calls to personal faith - the 'new covenant' both recognises that tension and resolves it in the different circumstances of the Christian faith.

by Gamaliel;
quote:
All of us are work-in-progress, and that applies as much to your apparently 'pure' and unsullied gathered model as it does to one which you might consider wickedly compromised ...

That's not to excuse wrong-doing or sinfulness.

But neither is it to enshrine some kind of smug, self-righteous separatism as some kind of Christian virtue.

I have said before that I don't regard the 'gathered model' as anywhere near 'pure and unsullied' - if only....

We still have to make the effort to avoid 'wrong-doing or sinfulness', not excuse it; and especially where a particular sinful course - the idea of 'Christian countries' - results in such horrendous consequences.

I'd have thought you'd have realised from my critical comments about Exclusive Brethren and the more exclusive type of Amish that I don't regard 'smug self-righteous separatism' as any kind of Christian virtue; but I do want Christianity to be separate in the NT sense, distinct from the surrounding pagan world.

also by Gamaliel;
quote:
On the communal thing, you say that the NT was freely available to all right from the outset - or have implied as much.

No it wasn't.

Most people couldn't read.

What was available was the apostolic deposit, the apostolic testimony - and where would most people have encountered that? Why, in this whacky community of faith we call the Church ...

NO, I didn't imply that the NT was available from the outset; it is the eventual written embodiment of the apostolic testimony, and as you say, eventual may have meant quite late (though the 'Honest to God' bishop of Woolwich favoured an early date), and wide availability took longer still. As such it provides us a touchstone for checking that we are in line with the apostolic testimony, and for rejecting traditions which have gone beyond that. The community alone could all too easily go in all directions without a stable foundation - the written apostolic testimony records that foundation so that the church may build on it with confidence not realistically possible just from the opinions of an 'apostolic succession' of bishops ever more removed from the original as time passes.

Once the NT was widely available it clearly became recognised as the primary authority; you may recall that in other recent threads RCs, for example, conceded that their 'magisterium' was not supposed to contradict the NT.

Enough for now - I have a busy afternoon ahead.

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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
... But put it this way, the ecclesiastical links with the state are straight-up disobedience to God


Can you point to a clear statement in scripture that is categoric authority for that blanket statement?
quote:

- understandable how it happened originally, in a messy way which didn't seem wrong at first, but after 1600 years the wrong is pretty obvious and the need to correct the wrong also pretty obvious.

Separating from a body that is engaging in such disobedience - is that schism? After all, continuing to be connected with such a body, is to join in their sin. Which we're not really meant to do, are we???

I'll leave you to think on that one....

Sorry, Steve, that may have been argued time and time over the centuries but it's pernicious and seriously wrong. Who are you, or anyone else, to say which sins require us to break the body of Christ into pieces and separate ourselves from the brothers and sisters he has chosen for us? Or are we saying we know which are the brothers and sisters he has chosen, and which are the deluded ones that are false disciples? Assuming we are taking scripture as authority, can you point me to clear teaching in scripture that (a) tells me to do this, and (b) tells me how to separate the weeds from the good crop?

Look. I don't agree with k-mann either, but Gamaliel, as so often, is talking a lot of sense.

--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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Gamaliel
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(Sighs) - don't misunderstand me, Steve, but one might just as well argue that whilst you or anyone else who is Free Church, non-conformist or independent or whatever we might wish to call such a position are not personally responsible or implicated in the actions of exclusive groups such as the Exclusive Brethren or extreme forms of Amish - you are nevertheless 'implicated' by the kind of stance you are taking.

Now, I'm not arguing such a thing - but you are effectively doing the same in reverse by suggesting that members of historic Churches with close ties to the State are somehow partaking of 'sin' in so doing.

At times it feels like you are promoting Docetism here rather than Anabaptism ... which perhaps not surprising given the positive slant put on Docetism by Stuart Murray Williams and other Anabaptist writers.

I've got a lot of time for Anabaptists and the Anabaptist position but it can easily fall into judgementalism ... Richard Baxter said that back in the 17th century. So did Anglican theologians in the 16th.

I don't see anything in your posts that contradicts the view that they - rightly or wrongly - formed four hundred years ago.

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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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leo
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
IS 'religion' communal? Old style pagan and Jewish religion indeed is 'communal' - but Christianity is rather different, precisely because it depends on the personal act of faith, and the personal being 'born again' by the Spirit.

Christianity is communal because we are baptised INTO THE BODY OF CHRIST, i.e. the Church.

Or are you seeing a 'personal act of faith' as the unbiblical notion of 'the sinner's prayer'?

--------------------
My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com

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Gamaliel
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I rather suspect that Steve Langton's view of a personal faith is rather more nuanced than the 'sinner's prayer' - but would share some of the assumptions behind this particular model ... in broad terms if not in the detail.

The 'sinner's prayer' thing is certainly crude and reductionist but in my experience many, if not most, evangelicals do have a more nuanced view than one might gather if only exposed to the rhetoric and the louder proponents of these views.

As a Baptist, as well as an Anabaptist - an Anabaptist is essentially a Baptist-Plus or, arguably, a Baptist who has stuck more closely to their own tradition - then Steve Langton will be fairly 'reformed'. I used a small r as Presbyterians and others might try to deny Baptists the Big R ...

As someone coming at these things from a fairly reformed direction then Steve will undoubtedly be keen to distance himself from 'decisionism' and the somewhat mechanical application of the 'sinner's prayer' and so on.

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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Gamaliel
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Before someone corrects me and to spare my own blushes ... [Hot and Hormonal]

In an earlier post I, of course, meant Donatism rather than Docetism.

My mistake.

I am not accusing Steve Langton of Docetism but suggesting that elements within Anabaptism do have Donatist tendencies.

--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.

http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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Steve Langton
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by Enoch;
quote:
Who are you, or anyone else, to say which sins require us to break the body of Christ into pieces and separate ourselves from the brothers and sisters he has chosen for us? Or are we saying we know which are the brothers and sisters he has chosen, and which are the deluded ones that are false disciples? Assuming we are taking scripture as authority, can you point me to clear teaching in scripture that (a) tells me to do this, and (b) tells me how to separate the weeds from the good crop?
No, I don't know the chosen ones. But I do have a responsibility for my own conduct and for judging what I do myself, and therefore who - and whose conduct - I associate with. Just to take a few examples where the 'state church' kind of issue has been directly relevant, should I be lined up with people who run Crusades, who set the Inquisition on Jews and Muslims in Spain, people who stage riots and throw bombs in Ulster, people who discriminate against unbelievers of all kinds in various states of the world? Should I be joining in the burning of heretics? Should I be supporting the kind of thing done by the Conquistadors to the native Americans in the name of Christ?

Should I not 'break up' my relationship with those who do such things?

There's also an issue that state churches often involve a break-up of the church in the first place - the spectacle of two 'Christian countries' at war, just for example...? Or the different Lutherans, Anglicans, Orthodox, Presbyterians all in different states and differing partly because of the involvement of the worldly state in the church....

There's also the other side of it; Even today, and certainly in the days of, for instance, Henry VIII's decidedly totalitarian church, the state church can be a problematic mix.

So if I feel it impossible to be involved with this - am I schismatic, or is the state church itself the schismatic side????

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