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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: biblical inerrancy
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
But, FF, the Bible as a stand-alone source did not provide the "solution" - the Church did, through the direction of the Holy Ghost. That's really my main point (as it was several pages back!). We needed the Church through the Hoily Ghost to ratify that "solution" as opposed to the numerous other heretical but equally "biblical" "solutions" that were doing the rounds.
CB
Which "Church"?
Yours in Christ
Matt
The one that met at Nicaea, Constantinople, Ephesus, Chalcedon, etc. precisely to define her doctrine of Trinity. The Church.
CB
Again, some evangelicals woudld be unhappy with that definition so that does not IMHO really take us very far forward.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
Matt, you wrote: quote:
And where precisely does the Baptist church I attend fit into that grand scheme of things?
Now I know what the words mean, but I'm not quite sure I have grasped the point at which you're getting. Care to amplify, at all?
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
Sorry, Matt, cross posted. Now I understand ![[Ultra confused]](graemlins/confused2.gif) . However, I would have thought that all Christians, be they ever so evangelical, would have valued the wisdom and testimony of the Church Fathers. I suspect this has the potential for a thread-derailler, though.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
Hang on, Matt, don't even have the slightest inkling that perhaps your local Baptist church may well be linked to some bigger - and I don't just mean BUGB - and that it is part of a movement, whether you like it or not, that takes in the people who participated in the great debates of the 4th and 5th centuries? Or are you one of those people who just thinks the Holy Spirit buggered off in approximately AD95 only to return to show the world how God was establishing his kingdom through his holy army of middle class British people with their Overhead Projectors and their copies of the NIV and Songs 'n' Hymns of Fellowship? ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
But, FF, the Bible as a stand-alone source did not provide the "solution" - the Church did, through the direction of the Holy Ghost. That's really my main point (as it was several pages back!). We needed the Church through the Hoily Ghost to ratify that "solution" as opposed to the numerous other heretical but equally "biblical" "solutions" that were doing the rounds.
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
How do errantists decide that doctrine is a "contradiction" worth accepting, but other "contradictions" are actually just that - contradictions caused by human error and misunderstanding?
Antiquity, universality, consensus.
As Matt asks, which church?
I think there's a rather "rose coloured specticles" view of the church being banded about on this thread - a church which cannot err and stray. Now, with a view on history, I find that much harder to believe than inerrancy!
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
[Well, yes the verses are contradictory taken on their own. But, we don't do that. There are a whole load of passages that make clear that God is one God (the only God), and this is a vital and inescapable part of the Jewish religion.
Likewise, the so called "genocide" passages are a vital and inescapable part of the Jewish religion - yet we are being urged to see as in error.
And by not accepting these passages, or the inerrancy of whole swathes of the OT, then some people here are indeed asking us to reject large parts of Scripture. Scriptures which are said to be contradictory - but aint necessarily so. Scriptures which may be teaching us truth about God which we're happily (and foolishly) ignoring.
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Now, would you kindly answer my questions?
If you and I both use the Scriptures, and faith, and prayer, and come up with different interpretations of an apparently contradictory passage, who gets to decide which is right?
I have answered this, as indeed has Lep, many times.
The question can equally be bounced back to you. If we take simply "Antiquity, universality, consensus", then whose ancient consensus do we take? The Catholic, Protestant, or Orthadox? When different churches live by faith, and prayer, and come up with different interpretations of an apparently contradictory passage, who gets to decide which is right?
The question is just as appropriate for you.
The answer, as I have already said, is that holding the scriptures as inerrant does not get rid of every interpretative problem. Nor does your stance. But the inerrancy of scripture does give us a framework and boundaries within which to tackle these issues of interpretation. Without these boundaries, churches can have a wonderful concensus over milennia - but be univerally wrong.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
I hope I've given some pointers in my last couple of posts. Some evangelicals, particularly those in the Radical Reformation traditions, in seeking to return to the sola scriptura of the NT and rejecting the compromise of the Constantinian Settlement, would be uncomfortable both with the terminology used and the definition of that term. So, again, I'm saying that it is not necessarily a helpful paradigm...
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
FF, you wrote: quote:
I think there's a rather "rose coloured specticles" view of the church being banded about on this thread - a church which cannot err and stray. Now, with a view on history, I find that much harder to believe than inerrancy!
Eh?? Where has anyone suggested any such thing? What has been suggested is that, over the centuries, there have been a lot of very Godly men and women, who have wrestled with the problem of interpreting the scriptures. Of course they were weak, sinful people. Who is not a weak, sinful person. They found the task difficult. We find it difficult. But we trust that the Holy Spirit can use their meditation and ours to help us to meet with the risen Lord.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by dyfrig:
Hang on, Matt, don't even have the slightest inkling that perhaps your local Baptist church may well be linked to some bigger - and I don't just mean BUGB - and that it is part of a movement, whether you like it or not, that takes in the people who participated in the great debates of the 4th and 5th centuries? Or are you one of those people who just thinks the Holy Spirit buggered off in approximately AD95 only to return to show the world how God was establishing his kingdom through his holy army of middle class British people with their Overhead Projectors and their copies of the NIV and Songs 'n' Hymns of Fellowship?
Nay, nay and thrice nay sir! I was merely pointing out that some evangelicals in the Radical Reformation tradition/ denominations may not be entirely happy with the definitions advanced here - note I didn't say that I was unhappy with the definition, although as an ex-catholic the term "holy catholic apostolic church" did unsettle me a bit. It's all very well saying "the Church", but an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist is going to have a very different idea of "the church" than a member of Opus Dei, for example. As FF has pointed out, when you say "the church", do you mean orthodox, catholic etc?
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
There was no Sola Scriptura in NT times. It just didn't exist in the way you want it to. Sola Scriptura emerges as a source of authority over against the institutional Papacy - if you reject one source of authority, you need another one to justify your position.
The apostles' authority lay somewhre - in the reality of the Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit. The apostles are proclaiming something - it will take them a long while to write it down, and even when they do they will leave a lot of gaps.
Now, this is not to say (I'm talking to you, Fish Fish) that everythng the Church then does is infallible - after all, a person doesn't stop doing bad things after they are "saved" or "baptised" or "born again" or "washed inthe blood of the Lamb". One of the Church's errors, of course, is to think that it can speak entirely without error.
But - and this is a big but - that doesn't mean that the Church cannot speak the truth. After all, only God is perfect, but we still trust him enough to be able to work through the blithering idiots he has called out to do his work.
And God's Holy Spirit, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified, must have some credit in the activities of the Church. You think he's present at your local church and I bet you'll be the first to admit that that ain't a place of sweetness and light all the time - why can't he be active at Chalcedon? Even just a teensy-weensy bit, getting people to understand, ""Look, this Jesus bloke, right? He's God, right? And he's human too? Got it?"
If you don't accept that God works with the crap he's got because he must even as a principle, then you have a very real difficulty - if you need a totally inerrant source of authority and truth other than God himself then you are either going to be disappointed (as there isn't one) or find one (the Bible, the Church, your favourite pastor, your own feelings) that will be an idol.
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
Matt, you wrote quote:
I hope I've given some pointers in my last couple of posts. Some evangelicals, particularly those in the Radical Reformation traditions, in seeking to return to the sola scriptura of the NT and rejecting the compromise of the Constantinian Settlement, would be uncomfortable both with the terminology used and the definition of that term. So, again, I'm saying that it is not necessarily a helpful paradigm...
Now I'm not such a fan of the Constantinian Settlement myself, but that's what happened, and it was the same tradition that created (or recognised, if you will) the NT Canon. To return to what you claim to be the Sola Scriptura of the early church would be to ditch the New Testament, because their Sola Scriptura would have been just the OT, until those nasty Orthodox types had decided what the NT would be.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
As Matt asks, which church?
Well, for a thousand years or so, there was only one Church. So, for questions that were asked and answered during that time, the answer is "The Church." Since then, my choice is to stick with the visible Church that has the most continuity with the Church of the first 1000 years. But, as C.S. Lewis explained in "Mere Christianity," even with all the divisions of the last millenium, there is still an enormous amount of doctrinal and practical unity among those who call themselves Christian.
quote:
I think there's a rather "rose coloured specticles" view of the church being banded about on this thread - a church which cannot err and stray. Now, with a view on history, I find that much harder to believe than inerrancy!
What's the last book on church history you've read, Fish Fish? What do you actually know about it?
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Now, would you kindly answer my questions?
If you and I both use the Scriptures, and faith, and prayer, and come up with different interpretations of an apparently contradictory passage, who gets to decide which is right?
I have answered this, as indeed has Lep, many times.[/qb][/quote]
No, you haven't. Or if you have, I'm too dense to have understood what you were saying. Try again, using smaller words and simple sentence structure.
quote:
The question can equally be bounced back to you. If we take simply "Antiquity, universality, consensus", then whose ancient consensus do we take? The Catholic, Protestant, or Orthadox?
You've misunderstood the principles. It's antiquity -- prefer the ancient interpretations to new ones; universality -- prefer the interpretations accepted by all or nearly all Christians of all places and times to those accepted by just a small group; consensus -- believe the consensus of those who are clearly holy for their entire life to the teachings of sinners like me. So "ancient consensus" isn't what we're looking for.
That said, there is no ancient Protestant church. As you surely know, for just over a thousand years, there was only one church. The councils and decrees of that church are accepted by the Orthodox, the Catholics, and by (most) Protestants -- although some Protestants won't admit it.
quote:
When different churches live by faith, and prayer, and come up with different interpretations of an apparently contradictory passage, who gets to decide which is right?
Either they agree to live in peace, deciding that it doesn't matter which one is right -- not all differences make a difference. Or they hold a council of bishops to hash out who is right. The bishops decide, together, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
quote:
The answer, as I have already said, is that holding the scriptures as inerrant does not get rid of every interpretative problem. Nor does your stance.
Are you willing to say that, if someone who believes in the inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures, comes to believe that your interpretation of the passages regarding homosexuality are incorrect, and that the Bible does NOT in fact teach that homosexual sex is wrong, but that that is simply a misinterpretation, are you willing to accept their interpretation as being as good as yours?
If someone who believes in the inerrancy of the Scriptures comes to believe that your interpretation of the passages suggesting that Gos is a Trinity are wrong, and that the Bible teaches that Jesus is the only God, and that the Father and the Holy Spirit are just different names for Jesus, are you willing to accept that interpretation as being as good as yours?
If not, by what authority do you reject their interpretation and accept yours?
quote:
But the inerrancy of scripture does give us a framework and boundaries within which to tackle these issues of interpretation. Without these boundaries, churches can have a wonderful concensus over milennia - but be univerally wrong.
Are you saying, Fish Fish, that St. Paul was rong when he said that the Church is the bulwark and foundation of Truth? Are you saying that our Lord lied when he said he would send the Holy Spirit to teach us truth? Are you saying that Jesus was wrong, and that the Gates of Hell can prevail over the Church? Or are you saying that the Holy Spirit is incompetent to teach the Truth?
Because those seem to be the implications of what you are saying.
Now, please, answer my questions:
Who decides what the Bible teaches?
Who gets to decide what's an acceptable explanation of a contradiction and what isn't?
Who decides which boundaries to use to narrow the field of legitimate interpretations?
If you and I both see something in the Bible that appears to be a contradiction, and we each, in good faith, with prayer, with reference to the rest of Scripture and to the best information we can find about genre, history, etc., come up with an explanation for that contradiction -- if our explanations differ, who gets to decide which one of us is right?
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by dyfrig:
But - and this is a big but - that doesn't mean that the Church cannot speak the truth. After all, only God is perfect, but we still trust him enough to be able to work through the blithering idiots he has called out to do his work.
I don't deny this for a minute. I don't think the HS left us at Pentecost.
But, the church "is infallible - after all, a person doesn't stop doing bad things after they are "saved" or "baptised" or "born again" or "washed inthe blood of the Lamb"".
So its need the HS if it is to survive at all. But then the quesiton becomes, how does the HS guide the church. And, as I've argued before, the HS breathed the auhtoritative scriptures so we can test today what he may be saying to the church. Having authoritative, inerrant scriptures gives us a record of what God said in the past, and narrows the field when trying to work out what God is saying today. This is not to say God cannot do a new thing (Lets not go down that track again). But is is to say, if God said something before, he won't contradict it today. Thus the inerrant Bible is by far the best tool we have for working out what God may be saying to his church.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
Dyfrig, I'm not sure whether your last post was directed in part towards me, but I'll respond to the last bit anyway
Yes of course God works with the crap He's got, but, and this is the but, that in no way makes the crap inerrant, whether that be a bunch of men meeting at Nicaea, Carthage, Ephesus, and Chalcedon or the current incumbent of the Holy See.
As I see it, God reveals Himself in the Person of Jesus through both His Church and His Word, and the issue of authority is where you consider the 'final say' to lie, in terms of interpreting that revelation. I put my faith in Scripture being inerrant, others here in the church being inerrant. Neither position 'idolises' either the Bible or the Church.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
As Matt asks, which church?
Well, for a thousand years or so, there was only one Church. So, for questions that were asked and answered during that time, the answer is "The Church." Since then, my choice is to stick with the visible Church that has the most continuity with the Church of the first 1000 years.
But I have a real problem with that as that same church made, IMO, a number of pretty dodgy doctrinal rulings in that 1000 years. So that simply doesn't wash with me.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
So its need the HS if it is to survive at all. But then the quesiton becomes, how does the HS guide the church. And, as I've argued before, the HS breathed the auhtoritative scriptures so we can test today what he may be saying to the church.
A profound question, young Fish. At the Reformation they found that much of what the Church taught didn't fit with the scriptures they had - how could the Church have got to where it was?
In the heat of polemics this turned from "Rome has got some things wrong that don't sit well with the Church's own scriptures" to "Everything Rome says and has said since the end of the first four Ecumenical Councils is wrong", which isn't the same thing.
And in this heat, the subtle possibility that there might be an organic, reasonable connection was lost - the Reformers were shouting at the Romans, the Romans were shouting at the Reformers. The possibility of calm, careful scholarship on both history and doctrine was virtually nil. And so people took sides (even in England, where our own little Erastian settlement was as much about keeping power as it was about anything else.) The Reformation was as much compromised as anything done in an ecumenical Council - Luther caved in to Philip's desire to be a bigamist; the Swiss states' human rights record was hardly spotless.
But were the Reformers right in every reform? Especially as there are so many branches of the Reformation - German, English, Scottish, Swiss, Scandinavian, Radical and eventually the "Counter-" Reformation - you can't really speak of a single Reformed voice on quite a lot of things, not least the Scriptures. In many things it "reformed" matters that it didn't understand - Purgatory as a doctrine was never about a "second chance" of salvation; its understanding of the primitive church and its claims to be like were, in the light of later scholarship, quite laughable. Yet we still trust that there was some value in the Reformation; despite all this, we still think that God was doing something worthwhile.
The Reformation doesn't really come to a conclusion about the Scriptures. In fact, no-one really articulates a doctrine of inerrancy for many years. It will be 200 hundred years before the Moravian pietists start opening the Bible at random for guidance, and another 200 before Fundamentalists start making inerrancy a new article of faith.
So, it boils down to this - Scripture is indeed authoritative for many, an authority nuanced in several ways to be sure, but still authoritative. It is the words which were wrapped around the Church's experience of God in Jesus Christ. But that does not make them inerrant; it does not mean they have to be inerrant; and it certainly does not mean tha tony inerrancy can safeguard their authority - that is the Holy Spirit's job.
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Well, yes the verses are contradictory taken on their own. But, we don't do that. There are a whole load of passages that make clear that God is one God (the only God), and this is a vital and inescapable part of the Jewish religion.
Likewise, the so called "genocide" passages are a vital and inescapable part of the Jewish religion - yet we are being urged to see as in error.
And by not accepting these passages, or the inerrancy of whole swathes of the OT, then some people here are indeed asking us to reject large parts of Scripture. Scriptures which are said to be contradictory - but aint necessarily so. Scriptures which may be teaching us truth about God which we're happily (and foolishly) ignoring
There is still a big difference between the genocide passages and the "your Lord God is one God".
Prior to the experience of Christ no one within Judaism seriously questioned it. Certainly within the OT the concept that there is any other god, or occasions when Israel drifted away from worship of the one God, is consistently and universally attacked - from the prophets especially. The first Christians, Jews almost exclusively, were faced with an experience that was to them undeniably that Jesus was God as was the Spirit they experienced at Pentecost and beyond. From the tension of their experience, completely at odds with their previous experience of God being one, recorded in the NT the Church developed the doctrine of the Trinity to resolve the issue - and never denied the truth of the old revelation that God is one.
The genocide passages, however, have always been discussed and debated. They belong to a strand of thought about the exclusivity of the nation of Israel as the people of God, specially chosen and pure. A strand of thought that appears in such events as the Ezra-Nehemiah restoration and religious reformation when the non-Jewish wives of Jews were sent away to restore the purity of the people, it reappears in the zealousness of the Pharisees seeking absolute obedience to the Law. It is countered by stories about people like Ruth, an ancestor of the great David the builder of an Isreali empire and writer of the Psalms and his son Solomon who built the Temple - but Ruth was a Moabite. Or, even within the Joshua accounts there's Rahab the prostitute. Or, howabout Jonah sent to preach to the Ninevites rather than the chosen people of God. These all, even within the OT, question whether God is a God who'll simply command the destruction of evil doers.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
Sorry Josephine, but you keep asking Fish Fish for an answer to your question, when he's already given one.
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
If you and I both see something in the Bible that appears to be a contradiction, and we each, in good faith, with prayer, with reference to the rest of Scripture and to the best information we can find about genre, history, etc., come up with an explanation for that contradiction -- if our explanations differ, who gets to decide which one of us is right?
Me.
![[Two face]](graemlins/scot_twoface.gif)
Is that what you're saying, Fish Fish? You realise of course that Josephine is arguing that she accepts the authority (to interpret Scripture, if nothing else) of the Church, whereas you are claiming... well, nothing other than your own reason, as far as I can tell?
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
Matt, I have been at apins to make it clear that I do not believe that any of the crap is inerrant. That's been my position from the start, to the point when I bowed out and now having stupidly got back into this it is still my position. I still don't understand how you can have an inerrant Scripture without also having an inerrant Church, an inerrant liturgy and inerrant sacraments, but that's just me.
Fish Fish, do you use commentaries?
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
As I've said all along, it's a faith, sorry, belief position.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
As Matt asks, which church?
Well, for a thousand years or so, there was only one Church.
No there wasn't. What about the Montanists, and Donatists, and Arians, and Nestorians, and Monophysites.
You and I might know that those folk are heretics & so noit to be trusted as to the interpretation of teachings. But did their flock at the time? Obviously not, otherwise they would have instantly left for the real church down the road.
quote:
Since then, my choice is to stick with the visible Church that has the most continuity with the Church of the first 1000 years.
Which for us here in Britain is either the Anglicans or the Presbyterians.
quote:
But, as C.S. Lewis explained in "Mere Christianity," even with all the divisions of the last millenium, there is still an enormous amount of doctrinal and practical unity among those who call themselves Christian.
Of course - but that also applies to those pesky Monophysites & Nestorians & Anglicans and Presbyterians.
To put it crudely, why should I leave my church (which has a historical continuity going back to the apostles) and join yours? (which also does). Are your apostles better than our apostles?
Now the Bible is a standard we can, more or less, agree on. We can look at it and interpret it and compare our interpretations. We can discuss it rationally. We can compare the teachings of the different churches on it, and see if which ones seem to us to reflect what it says.
Its relative constancy would seem, on the face of it, to be a much better yardstick to judge the diverse teachings of our different churches than the other way round.
It sounds like a good idea to submit my ubnderstanding of scripture and doctrine - two strands of Holy Tradition - to that other strand of Holy Tradition found in the Church. But when I walk out into the street I see many visible churches - a few claiming to be the only instance of the One True Church on Earth, many claiming to merely to be be a church, an instance of the Church. And not all those churches agree with each other, or are in communion with each other, or even recognise each other's existence.
But - despite all the kerfuffle with versions and translations and deuterocanonicals and al the rest of it - the Scriptures are more or less, on the whole, constant.
85% of anything that is claimed as Holy Scripture by any of the historically continuous Christian churches (The Orthodox, the Roman Catholics, the mainstream Protestants, the Armenians, the Egyptians) is recognised as Holy Scripture by all of them. 99% of the text comes out meaning the same in just about any modern translation (& 99.99% in most of them). Not even the liberalist liberal critics any longer claim that the whole thng was got up by some sort of horrid Constaninian conspiracy in the 4th century.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
As Matt asks, which church?
Well, for a thousand years or so, there was only one Church.
No there wasn't. What about the Montanists, and Donatists, and Arians, and Nestorians, and Monophysites.
You and I might know that those folk are heretics & so noit to be trusted as to the interpretation of teachings. But did their flock at the time? Obviously not, otherwise they would have instantly left for the real church down the road.
Right -- but the thing is, those teachings weren't heresies when they were first proposed by Arius or Nestorius or whomever. They were legitimate attempts to understand and make sense of the experience of the Church, the Holy Scriptures, and so on. There were different interpretations, leading to radically different understandings of God and of how we were to relate to him -- so the Church met in council to hammer it out.
You see that happening in the Book of Acts, in the Jerusalem Council, where, at the end of the council, the proclamation was made, "It seemed right to the Holy Spirit and to us...." Not "The Bible" but "the Holy Spirit and us."
And it happened over and over in the life of the Church. There would be a controversy. Of course people referred to the Bible to help resolve the conflict -- but because the Bible can be interpreted in many different ways, the bishops (and priests and deacons and others) met together to seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Together.
Once the question was resolved, and the resolution was accepted by the Church at large, then to hold the contrary teaching was understood to be heresy -- choosing wrongly. If Nestorius had bowed to the Council, had accepted that he was in error, and had thereafter taught the truth, then they would not have been counted heretics.
Being in error is not heresy. Choosing to remain in error is heresy.
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by josephine:
If you and I both see something in the Bible that appears to be a contradiction, and we each, in good faith, with prayer, with reference to the rest of Scripture and to the best information we can find about genre, history, etc., come up with an explanation for that contradiction -- if our explanations differ, who gets to decide which one of us is right?
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Me.
What else can he say?
Sola scriptura is ultimately sine ecclesia . It's a guy reading a book on his own. What happens then to "Wherever two or three are gathered together, there am I in the midst of them..."? So it's also a guy who's one short of a quorum for the Church. There's no such thing as a one-man church. So in that sense too, sola Scriptura is at war with solus Christus. To be an inerrantist is, in a profound sense, to be "One Christian short of the Church..."
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The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty.
"Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Me.
What else can he say?
I dunno. I was rather hoping he'd come back with "just joking!" and a serious answer.
His only answer so far seems to be, "Well, inerrancy doesn't mean there aren't still problems." That says absolutely nothing about how the problems are resolved.
What he seems to be saying is that any answer is legitimate as long as it has "sola scriptura" as the starting point. But he doesn't seem to believe that, no matter how much he says it. Otherwise, what difference would it make whether someone believed that homosexual relations were okay or not, or whether someone believed in the physical resurrection of our Lord or not? It seems, though, that he does think the answers you get matter.
And if so, then there has to be some way of resolving contradictions, if not for every difference of opinion, at least for the ones that matter. Some differences don't matter, of course -- but how is it decided which ones matter? By whom? Who decides which answers are good enough?
I really would like a serious answer!
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
All of us have both the right and privilege but also the responsibility of interpreting the Scriptures, guided as always by the Holy Spirit. Now, I accept that some form of faith community is necessary to act as a 'check and balance' on individualistic anarchy, but I see no absolutely no reason why this power needs to be concentrated in some form of episcopacy or magisterium who, apart from perhaps a better theological education (although I sometimes do question the value of that!) are no better qualified than you or I to interpret. In no way should anyone's interpretation be regarded as inerrant. I would also be suspicious of any kind of 'majority rule' being imposed as a hard and fast method of interpretation - if Luther had taken the view "well most of Christendom believes in indulgences and purgatory and has done for quite a while now - who am I to rock the boat?", we wouldn't have had the essential corrective move of the Reformation.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Either they agree to live in peace, deciding that it doesn't matter which one is right -- not all differences make a difference. Or they hold a council of bishops to hash out who is right. The bishops decide, together, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Would you seriously trust a comittee of bishops to determine doctrine without a greater authority than a nebulous "We're trusting the Spirit"? I wouldn't. No way! They need an authoritative text to guide them and determine their deliberations. A committee without the firm foundations of scripture will produce a theological camel...
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Are you saying, Fish Fish, that St. Paul was rong when he said that the Church is the bulwark and foundation of Truth? Are you saying that our Lord lied when he said he would send the Holy Spirit to teach us truth? Are you saying that Jesus was wrong, and that the Gates of Hell can prevail over the Church? Or are you saying that the Holy Spirit is incompetent to teach the Truth?
Check the context of when Paul says this! It's in the context of a church riddled with terrible teaching. A Church that has erred and strayed. Paul's solution? That the church is the source of truth when it follows the Apostle's teaching - our NT!!!
And of course I believe the Gates of Hell won't prevail over the church - the church that doesn't rely on their own sinful skewed wisdom - but relies on God's revelation of himself.
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Or, howabout Jonah sent to preach to the Ninevites rather than the chosen people of God. These all, even within the OT, question whether God is a God who'll simply command the destruction of evil doers.
Interesting stuff! It seems to me that God was always God of the whole world, and Israel was chosen to be a light to the Gentiles - so the Gentiles could also repent and turn to the living God. Israel consistently failed in this calling, and did become introverted. But that does not mean God does not judge other nations for their sins (hence the "genocide" passages). The Jonah story is an excellent example of this - God about to judge a nation apart from Israel - and yet graciously speaks to them through a prophet.
So I don't see a contradiction as you seem to.
quote:
Originally posted by dyfrig:
Fish Fish, do you use commentaries?
Yes. No problem there - so long as they too submit their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture.
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
Sorry Josephine, but you keep asking Fish Fish for an answer to your question, when he's already given one.
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Me.
That was a joke. ![[Yipee]](graemlins/spin.gif)
But is it what I think? No!! Which leads me onto this again...
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
Sola scriptura is ultimately sine ecclesia . It's a guy reading a book on his own. What happens then to "Wherever two or three are gathered together, there am I in the midst of them..."? So it's also a guy who's one short of a quorum for the Church. There's no such thing as a one-man church. So in that sense too, sola Scriptura is at war with solus Christus. To be an inerrantist is, in a profound sense, to be "One Christian short of the Church..."
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
And if so, then there has to be some way of resolving contradictions, if not for every difference of opinion, at least for the ones that matter. Some differences don't matter, of course -- but how is it decided which ones matter? By whom? Who decides which answers are good enough?
I really would like a serious answer!
I have kept referring us back to Lep's posts on this, for he did an excellent job of saying that Inerrancy does not solver every problem etc.
But I have also answered the question a while back. I'll try again. I said that I guess I am happy to accept Antiquity, universality, consensus. I'm happy not to be an individual, but submit to the wisdom of the church. But it has to be the church submitting itself to the authority of scripture. What I mean is, the church in deciding its theology does not simply pluck its theology out of thin air, even if it is centuries of thin air etc. But spends its time trying to understand the scriptures and come to consensus about them.
And if there is disagreement - then we disagree. But if we agree on innerancy, then we have some boundaries within which to debate, discuss, and hopefully over time resolve the issues. We also have the tools with which to do the job.
But if we reject innerancy, how on earth do we agree on anything? We have no authority external to the various churches to guide in any clear discernable way.
I'll say it again - what the HS said in the past gives us a wonderful, authoritative guide to what he may say to the church today. If we say this is not the case, then the boundaries fly apart, and the church is much less likely to come to any sort of consensus.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: quote:
Would you seriously trust a comittee of bishops to determine doctrine without a greater authority than a nebulous "We're trusting the Spirit"?
Er... who do you trust? Do you realize that this is you at last saying, without any equivocation at all, that you trust the Bible more than the Holy Spirit?
quote:
But if we reject innerancy, how on earth do we agree on anything? We have no authority external to the various churches to guide in any clear discernable way.
Jesus Christ!!!!! The Holy Spirit!!!
And of course: Holy Scripture!!!!! WHich we all accept as authoritative!!!!
![[brick wall]](graemlins/brick_wall.gif)
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The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty.
"Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
FishFish: quote:
Would you seriously trust a comittee of bishops to determine doctrine without a greater authority than a nebulous "We're trusting the Spirit"?
Er... who do you trust? Do you realize that this is you at last saying, without any equivocation at all, that you trust the Bible more than the Holy Spirit?
NO NO NO! I'm saying that the Spirit guides the church as he has always guided the church. So, by trusting the Bible, I am not only trusting him to guide us now, but trusting him to have given us an authoritative written guide to guide us. I would thus argue I trust him more than you, for I trust him to guide us in a written word and not just a "nebulous" way.
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
Jesus Christ!!!!! The Holy Spirit!!!
And of course: Holy Scripture!!!!! WHich we all accept as authoritative!!!!
...except where you disagree with it, and so assume authority over it.
And please don't blaspheme at me.
[ 23. March 2004, 09:47: Message edited by: Fish Fish ]
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
This discussion is like quicksand. I keep wanting to leave it but I haven't been able to.
Well now I am. It is doing my head in. Really. Its making want to grind away my teeth to dust.
So I must back out as the whole thing is becoming rather unproductive for my godliness. I am greatly resisting the temptation to type parting shots......
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He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
At the risk of turning this into a 'bash the bishop' session ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) , I don't see how rejecting the concept of episcopal interpretation means placing the Bible above the HS; clearly we need the HS to interpret the Bible - we all disagree on the method of interpretation.
Yours in Christ
Matt
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Or, howabout Jonah sent to preach to the Ninevites rather than the chosen people of God. These all, even within the OT, question whether God is a God who'll simply command the destruction of evil doers.
Interesting stuff! It seems to me that God was always God of the whole world, and Israel was chosen to be a light to the Gentiles - so the Gentiles could also repent and turn to the living God. Israel consistently failed in this calling, and did become introverted. But that does not mean God does not judge other nations for their sins (hence the "genocide" passages). The Jonah story is an excellent example of this - God about to judge a nation apart from Israel - and yet graciously speaks to them through a prophet.
So I don't see a contradiction as you seem to.
Well, actually I don't see it as such a big contradiction as some others (eg: the opening posts on this thread). But, the fact that it is a complexity in the nature of God that is addressed within the OT does make it slightly different from the Trinity, which is my main point.
I also note we seem to have gained a thread in Purgatory on this very subject so I might just continue this there.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
FF
After much reflection, I guess I can only assume we are using the word "authority" to mean different things, as you seem to see making a judgement on the meaning and reliability of a specific text (e.g. did God really say these things to Joshua as recorded, or was it Joshua's honest attempt to make sense, within his own worldview, of a transcendant and enigmatic encounter) as being antithetical to accepting the whole testimony of scripture as being "authoritative". I see no such contradiction, so either I'm being very thick or we are meaning different things by the words. I don't know how to resolve the problem, as none of the metaphors we have used for authority seems adequate to help our understanding.
Dictionary.com has the following: quote:
a) The power to enforce laws, exact obedience, command, determine, or judge.
One that is invested with this power, especially a government or body of government officials: land titles issued by the civil authority.
b) Power assigned to another; authorization: Deputies were given authority to make arrests.
c) A public agency or corporation with administrative powers in a specified field: a city transit authority.
d) An accepted source of expert information or advice: a noted authority on birds; a reference book often cited as an authority.
A quotation or citation from such a source: biblical authorities for a moral argument.
e) Justification; grounds: On what authority do you make such a claim?
f) A conclusive statement or decision that may be taken as a guide or precedent.
g) Power to influence or persuade resulting from knowledge or experience: political observers who acquire authority with age.
h) Confidence derived from experience or practice; firm self-assurance: played the sonata with authority.
Maybe you see biblical authority as an expression of definition a), whereas I would see it falling under definition d)? I dunno.
And BTW, I can't see why, from the context, you think that psyduck is "blasphemeing" at you. Shouting, maybe, but shouting an answer to the question you posed in your post immediately before the bit you snipped for quotation, viz quote:
But if we reject innerancy, how on earth do we agree on anything? We have no authority external to the various churches to guide in any clear discernable way.
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
NO NO NO! I'm saying that the Spirit guides the church as he has always guided the church.
In what way? Inerrantly? And if he leads the Church to believe that Scripture is not inerrant... ?
Can I try and answer your question once again as to how you can avoid setting yourself up over the scriptures without requiring them to be inerrant?
1. Inerrant <> authoritative. You keep raising this one as a straw man, saying that non-inerrantists throw away the scriptures they don't like. They don't. They interpret them differently from you, just as you interpret Genesis differently from a young earth creationist.
2. Inerrancy is IMHO, and I do mean this without offence, merely a name for an interpretative framework that assumes a higher level of literalism than the non-inerrantists do. You do not assume perfect literalism or you would accept Genesis as literal truth. Its claim that the bible contains no errors is founded on a particular pre-existing framework of interpretation that says such things as "Genesis is poetry", allowing you to take a non-literal interpretation of what it says.
As far as I can tell, nobody opposing you in this debate is claiming that the truth contained in the scriptures has no authority over them, merely that your interpretative framework is different from the one they use.
Now, getting back to the question of who interprets - Matt freely admits that it is on his own authority (hopefully guided by the Holy Spirit) that he interprets scripture. Will you admit the same? Cards on the table here, I must admit that I'm guilty of the same approach, because I tend to try and grasp the arguments that led the church to the conclusions it has reached (in the guidance of the Spirit) and judge them for myself, but equally I recognise my own incompetence (due primarily to stupidity I think but I have no defence against Josephine's argument about holiness either) to do so most of the time. So...
Submitting to the authority of the church isn't about setting mere humans above the revelation of God, for me. It's about giving an appropriate weight to the opinions of countless experts both contemporary and who've gone before me, in the belief that many of them were guided more effectively by the HS than I am allowing myself to be.
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: quote:
NO NO NO! I'm saying that the Spirit guides the church as he has always guided the church. So, by trusting the Bible, I am not only trusting him to guide us now, but trusting him to have given us an authoritative written guide to guide us.
You are saying that there's nothing that the Holy Spirit could tell us that isn't in the Bible. You are telling us that the Holy Spirit can't give us anything that we couldn't get by reading the Bible. You are telling us that if we have the Bible we really don't need the Holy Spirit. Of course, we have Him as an Optional Extra - a 'belt and braces' - but the Holy Spirit is really like a mute person with a book that he wrote a long time ago, basically just points and gesticulates to the effect that "It's all in there..."
He can't even pick out phrases to indicate "This is what I want to say right now..." because his book is without contradiction, therefore contrast, and it all says exactly the same thing. "What should the Church be doing about the growing gap between rich and poor, or saying about global ecological catastrophe?" [Gesticulates] "It's all in the Bible..." "Listen to what the Spirit is saying to the Churches!" [Listens. Decodes gesticulations] "It's all in the Bible..."
quote:
I would thus argue I trust him more than you, for I trust him to guide us in a written word and not just a "nebulous" way.
What I said. And by the way, how did the Church know that the writers of Holy Scripture were inerrantly inspired, and not just 'guided in a nebulous way'?
quote:
......except where you disagree with it, and so assume authority over it.
Disagree with it? You really haven't listened to anything on this thread, have you? You haven't the slightest idea how any of the rest of us read Scripture, have you? No doubt this is the abyss out of which this came:
quote:
And please don't blaspheme at me.
How dare you accuse me of blasphemy. If you can shout your mantras, I can draw your attention in a metaphorically loud voice, to my sources of authority.
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The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty.
"Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
Maybe you see biblical authority as an expression of definition a), whereas I would see it falling under definition d)? I dunno.
Yeah, you may be right. It seems to me that if something perports to as revelation from God, then it is more authoritative than a reference book on birds!
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
2. Inerrancy is IMHO, and I do mean this without offence, merely a name for an interpretative framework that assumes a higher level of literalism than the non-inerrantists do. You do not assume perfect literalism or you would accept Genesis as literal truth. Its claim that the bible contains no errors is founded on a particular pre-existing framework of interpretation that says such things as "Genesis is poetry", allowing you to take a non-literal interpretation of what it says.
I'm sorry, ISTM that if we don't interpret writing in the style of its writing, then we have no hope of understanding what is really being written. What is the laternative? We'd make nonsense of the text.
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
As far as I can tell, nobody opposing you in this debate is claiming that the truth contained in the scriptures has no authority over them, merely that your interpretative framework is different from the one they use.
It still seems to me that is exactly what people are doing. Saying, in any sense, "This is in error" is to say "I know best" - hardly a stance of submission to something greater or wiser or revealing God.
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
Now, getting back to the question of who interprets - Matt freely admits that it is on his own authority (hopefully guided by the Holy Spirit) that he interprets scripture. Will you admit the same? Cards on the table here, I must admit that I'm guilty of the same approach, because I tend to try and grasp the arguments that led the church to the conclusions it has reached (in the guidance of the Spirit) and judge them for myself, but equally I recognise my own incompetence (due primarily to stupidity I think but I have no defence against Josephine's argument about holiness either) to do so most of the time. So...
Submitting to the authority of the church isn't about setting mere humans above the revelation of God, for me. It's about giving an appropriate weight to the opinions of countless experts both contemporary and who've gone before me, in the belief that many of them were guided more effectively by the HS than I am allowing myself to be.
Yeah - of course I interpret the scriptures. But then I do also go to "the church" to seek wiser, consensus interpretation - by reading comentaries etc. And the church teaches me the doctrine of the Trinity, which I guess I may work out over time by reading scripture alone - but the church
saves me time by teaching what has been gleaned from the scriptures before.
So, I do interpret - but do so also relying on the wisdom of the church. But again, this is always subject to change with a deeper understanding of the scriptures.
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
FishFish: You are saying that there's nothing that the Holy Spirit could tell us that isn't in the Bible. You are telling us that the Holy Spirit can't give us anything that we couldn't get by reading the Bible.
No, that's not really what I'm saying - though it could seem like that I guess. What I meant was that the Spirit will not contradict what he's said before. So, for example, ISTM that the Spirit has made clear his teaching on sexual morality in the Bible. So I would be suspicious of any claim that the Spirit was saying that, in todays day and age, things have changed.
So the Spirit can and does say new things - but they would never contradict what he's said before.
Sorry if I wasn't clear on that before.
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
How dare you accuse me of blasphemy. If you can shout your mantras, I can draw your attention in a metaphorically loud voice, to my sources of authority.
By saying, in response to one of my posts,
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
Jesus Christ!!!!!
...that reads, IMO, as though you are blaspheming - ie using Jesus' name inapropriately. If that's not the case, then please at least be aware that that is how it seemed to me.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Saying, in any sense, "This is in error" is to say "I know best"
And, saying of something that "this cannot be an error" isn't saying "I know best"???
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: quote:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
How dare you accuse me of blasphemy. If you can shout your mantras, I can draw your attention in a metaphorically loud voice, to my sources of authority.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By saying, in response to one of my posts,
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
Jesus Christ!!!!!
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...that reads, IMO, as though you are blaspheming - ie using Jesus' name inapropriately. If that's not the case, then please at least be aware that that is how it seemed to me.
SO what have we here? Your post abstracts what I'm saying from its clear context, and then tells me that you understand what it means better than I do. And then when I protest your imputation, another post tells me that you decide what I mean. I see a pattern here...
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The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty.
"Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
FishFish: quote:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
How dare you accuse me of blasphemy. If you can shout your mantras, I can draw your attention in a metaphorically loud voice, to my sources of authority.
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By saying, in response to one of my posts,
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
Jesus Christ!!!!!
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...that reads, IMO, as though you are blaspheming - ie using Jesus' name inapropriately. If that's not the case, then please at least be aware that that is how it seemed to me.
SO what have we here? Your post abstracts what I'm saying from its clear context, and then tells me that you understand what it means better than I do. And then when I protest your imputation, another post tells me that you decide what I mean. I see a pattern here...
And I read that as a total retraction of all your theology, a grovelling apology, and submission to my wiser ways.
Glad you saw sense in the end.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Saying, in any sense, "This is in error" is to say "I know best"
And, saying of something that "this cannot be an error" isn't saying "I know best"???
No, its acknowledging the God who cannot lie or be in error and his revelation to us. Its not trusting my wisdom, but submitting to his.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
FF, in my post of 11:21 I wrote quote:
I don't know how to resolve the problem, as none of the metaphors we have used for authority seems adequate to help our understanding.
I then, in an attempt to further clarify the situation, quoted a definition of authority extracted from a dictionary; to which you responded quote:
It seems to me that if something perports to as revelation from God, then it is more authoritative than a reference book on birds!
OK, I accept, from your use of a smiley, that the comment was intended to be light hearted, and I'm as tempted by the cheap shot as the next man, but do you not see the problem I have here. No matter what analogy I use to explore the differences between us, it is never accurate enough for you to grasp the point. I don't really feel that there is any meaningful engagement here, just continuous restatement of your position, viz, I believe the Bible is inerrant, therefore the bible is inerrant (oh, and let's throw in one verse from Matt 5 for good measure.) For all the twenty-odd pages of posts, I still don't understand why you feel that there is such a close identification between inerrancy and authority, and when I try to explore this area, I don't get any genuine feedback from you.
Futhermore, you still haven't answered my oft-repeated question, viz. if, as you say, you submit yourself to the authority of scripture, would you be prepared to change your position wrt inerrancy if you were to become convinced, as I am, that the Bible does not teach that it is itself inerrant?
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To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
Posts: 3011 | From: A village of gardens | Registered: Sep 2002
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
I'm sorry, ISTM that if we don't interpret writing in the style of its writing, then we have no hope of understanding what is really being written. What is the laternative? We'd make nonsense of the text.
But Genesis isn't poetry. It follows none of the conventions of Jewish poetry. If anything, it's genre is Myth.
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
Damn. I mean "its".
(also, am refering specifically to the Creation accounts, rather than the whole of Genesis)
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Saying, in any sense, "This is in error" is to say "I know best"
And, saying of something that "this cannot be an error" isn't saying "I know best"???
No, its acknowledging the God who cannot lie or be in error and his revelation to us. Its not trusting my wisdom, but submitting to his.
No, it's you saying "I know God cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know the Bible is Gods revelation to us" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know that Gods revelation, like God, cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better").
Basically, you know better.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
FF observed, re use of commentaries:
Yes. No problem there - so long as they too submit their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture.
So the task of simply explaining the text as it stands isn't good enough - it has to be explained within a particular already held position. So, 2Tim Whatever it is and similar passages have to be interpreted as saying that all scripture is inerrant because the only acceptable premise for FF is that scripture is inerrant. Otherwise, it's putting the commentator's wisdom above God's.
Hmmmmmmm...........
Well, at least it's not just him on his own - he accept the wider testimony of the Church, through some of its scholars, to what the scriptures might mean. It's a start.
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
As far as I can tell, nobody opposing you in this debate is claiming that the truth contained in the scriptures has no authority over them, merely that your interpretative framework is different from the one they use.
It still seems to me that is exactly what people are doing.
Yes, that's because you're NOT LISTENING.
You refuse to accept authority <> inerrancy in spite of several good examples. You refuse to even consider any other position from your own as being valid. This isn't debate.
I give up.
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: quote:
Yes. No problem there - so long as they too submit their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture.
And just exactly what constitutes their "submitt[ing] their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture..."? What do they have to do, in order to be doing that?
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The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty.
"Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Either they agree to live in peace, deciding that it doesn't matter which one is right -- not all differences make a difference. Or they hold a council of bishops to hash out who is right. The bishops decide, together, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Would you seriously trust a comittee of bishops to determine doctrine without a greater authority than a nebulous "We're trusting the Spirit"? I wouldn't. No way! They need an authoritative text to guide them and determine their deliberations. A committee without the firm foundations of scripture will produce a theological camel...
Of course they need an authoritative text. And they have one! What have I said here to make you think they wouldn't use the Holy Scriptures to help figure out what the Holy Scriptures mean?
But they don't use the Holy Scriptures in isolation -- they use them with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, in the context of the tradition of the Church, with all the scholarship and wisdom and holiness they can bring to bear. What's wrong with that?
[quoteAnd of course I believe the Gates of Hell won't prevail over the church - the church that doesn't rely on their own sinful skewed wisdom - but relies on God's revelation of himself.[/quote]
The Church is the Body of Christ, Fish Fish. What can it rely on but God's revelation of himself in the person of Jesus Christ, with the help of the Holy Spirit?
quote:
Originally posted by dyfrig:
Fish Fish, do you use commentaries?
Yes. No problem there - so long as they too submit their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture.[/qb][/quote]
By this, you seem to mean, "As long as they agree with what I have already decided to be true."
Take an example, Fish Fish. Suppose a fellow inerrantist decided that, based on context and genre and whatnot, that our Lord and Savior did not literally rise from the dead, that those passages were poetic, metaphorical expressions of a spiritual rising.
I would assume that we would both consider him wrong. On what basis would you say he's wrong?
quote:
But if we reject innerancy, how on earth do we agree on anything? We have no authority external to the various churches to guide in any clear discernable way.
We have the Holy Spirit, Fish Fish! Do you not think the Holy Spirit is competent to do the job? If every copy of the Bible on earth were destroyed tomorrow, would that be an end of salvation? Would there be no more faith?
Inerrancy is a modern tool for understanding the Holy Scriptures, Fish Fish. We need the Bible. But we don't need an inerrant understanding of it in order to submit ourselves to God.
quote:
I'll say it again - what the HS said in the past gives us a wonderful, authoritative guide to what he may say to the church today. If we say this is not the case, then the boundaries fly apart, and the church is much less likely to come to any sort of consensus.
Authoritative, yes. Absolutely. Without question. Without a doubt. Everyone on this thread has argued that the Bible IS authoritative. You keep telling us that we don't think so. We keep telling you that we do.
Are you having that much trouble understanding what we're saying? Or do you think we're all a bunch of liars?
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
For all the twenty-odd pages of posts, I still don't understand why you feel that there is such a close identification between inerrancy and authority, and when I try to explore this area, I don't get any genuine feedback from you.
I'm sorry that I'm not being clear. I don't know how to be clearer on the issue of authority and innerancy.
Let me say it again in a question I keep repeating - but using different terms. If I have the wisdom and insight to spot errors in the Bible, and so know better than the authors what is true and untrue, how can I still say that I submit to its wisdom?
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
You refuse to accept authority <> inerrancy in spite of several good examples. You refuse to even consider any other position from your own as being valid. This isn't debate.
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
I don't get any genuine feedback from you.
I honestly have no idea what you mean by this, cos I've been trying my best in interact and respond. But I haven't heard anything to change my view yet. Do I have to change my opinion to be genuinely interacting or for this to be a debate?
quote:
Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
Futhermore, you still haven't answered my oft-repeated question, viz. if, as you say, you submit yourself to the authority of scripture, would you be prepared to change your position wrt inerrancy if you were to become convinced, as I am, that the Bible does not teach that it is itself inerrant?
Sorry not to have answered this before.
Yes.
quote:
Originally posted by Stoo:
But Genesis isn't poetry. It follows none of the conventions of Jewish poetry. If anything, it's genre is Myth.
Yep, I was wrong in calling it poetry. I'm not certain what genre it is. Whatever its genre, it is treated as true in the NT, and so not Myth. And whatever genre, my statement still stands:
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
I'm sorry, ISTM that if we don't interpret writing in the style of its writing, then we have no hope of understanding what is really being written. What is the laternative? We'd make nonsense of the text.
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
No, its acknowledging the God who cannot lie or be in error and his revelation to us. Its not trusting my wisdom, but submitting to his.
No, it's you saying "I know God cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know the Bible is Gods revelation to us" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know that Gods revelation, like God, cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better").
Basically, you know better. [/QB][/QUOTE]
No - ISTM that's what the bible says - so since that's what ISTM to be saying then I'll point to it and away from my puny wisdom. And if it becomes apparent that the Bible says otherwise, then I'll change my opinion.
quote:
Originally posted by dyfrig:
So the task of simply explaining the text as it stands isn't good enough - it has to be explained within a particular already held position.
I didn't say that. What I was freely admitting was that I don't know everything - so I'm happy to listen to others who know much more, and have studdied deeply, and who themselves are submitting to the text and seeking its true meaning, and not to impose their meaning on it.
That is my answe to this ...
quote:
Originally posted by ...psyduck...:
And just exactly what constitutes their "submitt[ing] their wisdom to the supreme authority of scripture..."? What do they have to do, in order to be doing that?
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
But they don't use the Holy Scriptures in isolation -- they use them with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, in the context of the tradition of the Church, with all the scholarship and wisdom and holiness they can bring to bear. What's wrong with that?
If they are seeking the meaning of the text, and if they will submit themselves and their church to what it says, then there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. It sounds wonderful!
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Take an example, Fish Fish. Suppose a fellow inerrantist decided that, based on context and genre and whatnot, that our Lord and Savior did not literally rise from the dead, that those passages were poetic, metaphorical expressions of a spiritual rising.
I would assume that we would both consider him wrong. On what basis would you say he's wrong?
On the basis of my understanding of the text. I'm not claiming inerrancy of my interpretation. But I would stand my ground on that issue cos I think they would be wrong. What's wrong with that?
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
We have the Holy Spirit, Fish Fish! Do you not think the Holy Spirit is competent to do the job? If every copy of the Bible on earth were destroyed tomorrow, would that be an end of salvation? Would there be no more faith?
Yes the Spirit is competant. Of course.
No we wouldn't lose salvation.
But none of that negates the fact that God gives us the scriptures so we know what he thinks, and don't have to rely on the wise counsel of flawed, sinful humans. His Spirit gave us the scriptures - and I trust the Spirit to give us them faithfully and accurately.
quote:
Originally posted by josephine:
Authoritative, yes. Absolutely. Without question. Without a doubt. Everyone on this thread has argued that the Bible IS authoritative. You keep telling us that we don't think so. We keep telling you that we do.
Are you having that much trouble understanding what we're saying? Or do you think we're all a bunch of liars?
No of course I don't think you're a bunch of liars.
But I still think that if have the wisdom to determine what is true and what is in error, then we assume a greater wisdom than in the Bible. And I still have a problem with that concept.
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Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
Posts: 672 | Registered: Jan 2004
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
FF:
seeking its true meaning, and not to impose their meaning on it.
Ah, but you see, that's the problem. "Seeking it's true meaning" is an odd phrase, because texts are slippery things. Where does meaning lie?
In the author's mind? So what was in the mind of the author of Chronicles when he said that David's motiviations for the census were different from those recorded in Kings? Or that someone else seems to have killed Goliath?
In the editor's mind? So what shall we say about an editor who puts together documents which don't harmonise in some places?
In the worshipping community's mind? What shall we say then of a community that accepts as authoritative texts that don't always agree?
In the modern reader's mind? What shall we say then of a person who has no concept of ancient Insraelite society and interprets these odd stories about priests and Levites and pomegranates in ways that the Israelites wouldn't recognise?
And what does it say about a God who lets himself be known through such a strange collection of texts?
See? Where is this "deeper meaning" to be found? How do you know when you've found it? How do you know that "inerrancy" as a tool will let you find it, when the texts themselves neither claim this particular brand of it nor, on closer study, stand up to such a claim in the first place?
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
No, it's you saying "I know God cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know the Bible is Gods revelation to us" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better"). It's saying "I know that Gods revelation, like God, cannot lie or be in error" (and "if others don't know that then, I know better").
Basically, you know better.
No - ISTM that's what the bible says - so since that's what ISTM to be saying then I'll point to it and away from my puny wisdom. And if it becomes apparent that the Bible says otherwise, then I'll change my opinion.
But, ISTM to be saying something different. We are both standing in the same place, reading Scripture based on how it seems to be to each of us. There is no difference in our approach. Yet you insist that when I read Scripture I stand in authority over it, and when you do it it stands in authority over you.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
I'm sorry that I'm not being clear. I don't know how to be clearer on the issue of authority and innerancy.
Let me say it again in a question I keep repeating - but using different terms...
It's not that you're not being clear. It's that you ignore the parts of the debate you don't wish to hear, and then claim that no-one's responding to you. You discount analogies continuously, and then say that no-one's answering you. You repeat your questions which have been answered because you say the answers did not satisfy you.
You don't need to be clearer in what you're saying. We know what you are saying. You need to think about others' arguments, and not just discount them because you dislike them. Or is this some form of clever irony - accusing us of discounting what we dislike, and you doing the very same thing in this "debate"?
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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