I'm becoming Orthodox

DT<
I don't have near the time to respond to each point you address me on in the long, long post above and partly in the closest post above.

Arius and other heretics misused the scripture. The diety of Christ is clearly taught in scripture and just because heretics try to prove their doctrines from scripture does not mean the Bible is not sufficient as a way to measure false doctrine. We will always have heretics until Christ comes again and Christ and Paul and Peter warned about them in the Bible.

Somehow Christians are able to stay in unity on the essentials because of the Bible's teachings. I speak in Lutheran, Methodist, Baptist, Bible, non-denominational, Presbyterian, etc. churches with no problem. I am one with all other believers in Christ. It is the HS who unites us, not men. So no matter the failings of men or our differences, all believers are able to still be part of the one true church.

As far as the bread and wine being the body and blood, I'm sorry but I do not think you prove your point. Paul's statement in 1 Cor. 11.27 is about disrespecting the atonement of Christ by the way they were celebrating the communion meal.
I do not see anything there that indicates it is literally the body and blood of Christ, but rather a reference to the atonement and sacrifice of Christ.

If Christ's death was sufficient on the cross, there is no need for his body to be broken again and again, nor need for his blood to be continually spilled.

 

It should be pointed out that both Luther and Calvin believed in a real presence in communion.

Luther believed that the Eucharist was the body and blood of Christ BUT the elements were not changed as Roman Catholicism taught.

Calvin believed that when one partook of the Lord's Supper by Faith in remembrance of Him that one spiritually fed upon Christ in their hearts and minds. This was the view held by early Presbyterians, Anglicans and Baptists (AND THE CORRECT VIEW IN MY OPINION).

Zwinglian theology holds that it is a mere memorial of Christ death BUT this seems to be the opposite error of the Roman Catholic view since Paul is clear in 1 Cor. 10 that a real communion with Christ takes place in communion.

The Eastern Orthodox view of the real presence is never defined by them since they believe there is no need. I think their view is somewhere between Luther's and Rome.

 

Marcia,

It is a never ending source of complete amazment to me regarding how folks in the "Orthodox" and Catholic groups can be so utterly blind to something that is so obvious.

I can just hear in advance the response...

"Why, how can their be unity with 30,000 competing denominations all disagreeing with each other, and all coming up with new doctrines???"



And Mike says...

"Beam me up, Scotty!" :D

God bless,

Mike

 

But Arius and his followers (and other heretics for that matter) maintained it was the orthodox who were misusing Scripture as the scriptures clearly taught that Christ was created and inferior to the Father. They each had their own proof texts to support their ideas as well as explanations for the problem passages for their beliefs. (see again the comments by Vincent of Lerins).

True, but how does one tell who are the heretics based on "sola Scriptura" without begging the question of interpretation?

"Somehow"...but then that all depends on what you think the "essentials" are since some of those groups may not agree. (Unless you mean that the "essentials" are those areas in which they happen to believe with your list of what's essential, derived from a certain soteriological framework--ie, the baptist one) For instance Lutherans believe in baptismal regeneration and the real presence in the Eucharist and would consider such beliefs "essential" while obviously you do not.

Yet the Holy Spirit hasn't inspired mutually contradictory doctrines (including some involving some key areas) which have precluded different denominations from truly worshipping together. That is, unless certain members of the different denominations have seen fit to relativize the truth except in the case of some amorphous group of minimalistic essentials.

The Holy Spirit was promised to guide the Church (which is the fulness of Him who fills all in all) into all truth--not to scatter bits and pieces of the truth into separate denominations in hopes that we'd all piece it back together like a jig-saw puzzle.

It indicates both since the fact that the bread and wine are the literal communion of the real body and blood of Christ is what makes present the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ.

Christ's body is not "broken again and again" nor is His "blood continually spilled". He was indeed sacrificed once for all, but in the Eucharist Christians participate in that one sacrifice since the bread is the communion of His body and the wine is the communion of His blood.

 

Good post. It goes to show that the Zwinglian view, although widely prevalent in today's neo-Evangelicalism, is, in the historical scheme of things, the doctrinal novelty.

 

Indeed.

 

I do not deny that Protestantism has been influenced by gnostic ideas as well. I have pointed some of them out in other discussions. Gnosticism was a very varied system of thought, and different forms of it have come into Christianity of all stripes. Unfortunately,people are better at pointing out its manifestations on other groups, than in their own.

But you're just presuming some new form of incarnation without any substantiation except for "tradition". Anyone can do that with any teaching.

Well, it looks like it's you that may be onto something. :cool: Still, you are rather vague about this "invisible reality". You denied that there was some parallel "spirit" bread & wine floating next to or in the physical elements, and the above response was supposed to answer that, but it was to that same point you said I was onto something.

Once again; I believe this is so because as I said above: I guess eating was so important, because you are taking something into your body--into yourself, and sharing the same substance, so it points to oneness. Once again, eating together is a significant event even in the world.

Still, as I said somewhere before, if it were purely "apostolic tradition" that determined the canon; there were many writings (attributed to NT figures, and some postapostolic) that had the catholic doctrines, that did not deny any other truth. All of these would have been included if those were truly apostolic traditions, and that was the only criterion for inclusion. But the fact that those doctrines were consistently omitted fromn the books chosen shows otherwise. The books were most likely compared with each other. Some were unanimously accepted early on, and ones in question could be judged by them. That is precisely why the books promoting "Catholic" doctrines were all left out, even though those 4th century "catholics" wanted so much to include them! Once again, that is sure evidence that God worked through them in spite of themselves!

Once again; that's not really true. Their "details" still maintained scriptural principle. Even "true circumcision" being a spiritual one could be found in OT passages! There was no total innovation. Else, the Bereans would not be able to verify anything form the scriptures.

But demons apparently could take on some visible manifestation as well. It is they who manifest themselves in various ways and in various things, while Christ came once as a man, and has gone back up to the Father, and sent the Holy Spirit to reside in us.

 

Luther's view sounds pretty much like the ORthodox view, at least as DT is presenting it.
On the other hand, Calvin's view I could basically agree with: We feed spiritually on Christ in the heart and mind, not some "literal" (physical) feeding on real "flesh and blood" (which to me sounds like, and thus necessitated Rome's view of a "change". Else, if it was not "changed"; then was it always flesh and blood even as it was manufactured and before?). I would think this is what Zwingli tried to express as "symbol", though I do not know how much he disputed with Calvin on that. Still; I think many more of the much derided so-called "Zwinglian" Protestants here would at least somewhat agree with Calvin.

Nobody's suggesting that, as if God did it that way deliberately. The truth became scattered as men went off with their own teachings. Many aim to piece it back together, but then they can be wrong on thigs as wel. Still, you are looking at organizations built around these erroneous [extra] "essentials", rather that looking at a body of believers in Christ (regardless of what people add to the simplicity of Christ; and focusing on Christ alone is thekey yo unity,m and not "minimalistic", as if "the truth" is defined by a long list of doctrines, such as a catechism. Now who's "reducing" the faith to a book? ).

 

Christians have maintained historic, orthodox faith for 2,000 years. If we couldn't tell heresy by the Bible, then that makes the bible a pretty useless book. Sure, false teachers have proof-texts but they either take those texts out of context or twist them or read a meaning that is not there. It is not that hard to see. It might be subtle, but you can ferret it out.

As a new believer with only a little Bible knowledge, I knew the JW's and Mormons were wrong in their theology. I knew universalism was wrong. I had discussions with people with no help, just using the Bible. Part of this was using the Bible and part of it was the HS witnessing in my spirit as to the truth. But it's in conjunction with God's word.

Heb. 4.12 tells us that God's word has power - it judges us in our spirit and hearts, convicts of sin, and convicts us of the truth. It is not just a guidebook that can mean anything. I reject the deconstruction of language. Words mean something.

Differences among believers do not mean we are not in unity by the HS. There is one Spirit and one truth.

 

Not at all. I repeat that Christ became Incarnate once, but He who took on the material form of man (which He still has) can certainly communicate His divine-humanity to us in the material forms of bread and wine in such an intimate way that become His very body and blood. Such would not be out of the question for the God who communicated to Moses from a burning bush.

The invisible reality is the body of Christ that was broken for us and the blood of Christ that was spilled for us. I don't see what's so "vague" about that.

The body was broken and the blood was spilled at Calvary. It isn't "floating" anywhere. However, by eating the bread and drinking the wine we make present the one sacrafice of Christ and have genuine communion with His real body and blood so that His flesh is food indeed and His blood drink indeed.

Once again; that's not really true. Their "details" still maintained scriptural principle. Even "true circumcision" being a spiritual one could be found in OT passages! There was no total innovation.</font>[/QUOTE]But the details weren't specifically spelled out in the OT. The institutions of the eucharist and baptism perhaps were hinted out but not spelled out in detail, particularly in relationship to the New Covenant. In fact, the OT doesn't even specifically say the Messiah was going to be named "Jesus". It took the apostolic preaching and teaching to reveal this. I remind you that the New Covenant wasn't fully revealed until Christ and the apostles (see Eph 3:3-6).

The main thing that Bereans were able to verify from Scripture was Paul's claim that the Scriptures taught the Messiah must suffer and rise again. This was the focus of what he was preaching in the Acts 17. Since he was reasoning from the Scriptures (v.2-3) a certain teaching, it only made since to verify that the specific teaching was indeed found in the Scriptures (v.11). Beyond that, it is a leap of logic to assume that everything else that Paul ever taught about was found directly in Scriptures and would thus have to be verified by them.

But none became Incarnate and none are the God-man who can communicate His divine-humanity to us in the forms of bread and wine.

Yet we still have communion with Christ--His divinity and humanity--in the Eucharist.

 

Still, as I said somewhere before, if it were purely "apostolic tradition" that determined the canon; there were many writings (attributed to NT figures, and some postapostolic) that had the catholic doctrines, that did not deny any other truth. All of these would have been included if those were truly apostolic traditions, and that was the only criterion for inclusion. </font>[/QUOTE]But I never said that it was "purely" apostolic tradition that determined canonicity, nor that it was the "only" criterion. Notice above that I had mentioned that genuine apostolic authorship was also a main criterion. If they kept the canon open and included everything consistent with apostolic tradition--though not proved to be authored by the apostles themselves--then our Bibles would be much too big to carry to Bible study. :D

At any rate, as I've said before, it was the circulation of spurious works falsely claiming apostolic authorship (and Marcion wanting to limit true apostolic writings to those of Paul) that even led to the idea of a NT canon in the first place.

 

God spoke in an audible voice from the burning bush. That was a theophany. To convey invisible, inaudible realities, God does not need to "inhabit" anything, except us through the Spirit.

What's vague is exactly what this has to do with the bread and wine. You compare it to the incarnation, but say it's not another incarnation. You say it doesn't "change", you say the spirit doesn't "float" besides or in it, and and now you compare it to the burning bush.

See, this is another example of the vagueness I'm talking about. What do you mean "make present"? That could mean one of two things. Either a "change"; like the RCC, or it would be something closer to what we call "symbolic". Christ is present in us (communion), and His sacrifice "shown" as we eat the bread and wine representing His flesh and blood. You're not being very clear on exactly how the bread and wine figure into the "presence".

Uh, the Eucharist was originally the Passover seder. That's what was so significant when Jesus instituted the Supper. Baptism reflected the passing through the Red Sea, and came to be used by the Jews for that reason before the apostles. It's not like the apostles introduced these totally foreign new practices that nobody had heard of before.

His actual given name was not what was so important. The Jews understood that thiose names used int he OTT were titles for the Messiah's mission. His actual name is a historic reality that was first given by the angel, not something the apostles made up off the top of their heads, or Jesus revealed to them secretly and were then omitted from all the writings.

It had to at least be based on the scriptures (if at least prophetically/symbolically), and not some new novelty, and the examples you have been giving do not fit that category.

But if this is not another incarnation, then why keep making the Incarnation the proof that God could do this?

But you do seem to be suggesting it would have been impossible to weed the false books out without the tradition. Even if it was both tradition and comparing books, still, many of those other books would have still passed, because not all of them taught things considered false by the Church of that period.

 

Because you seem make a big deal of the fact that God doesn't use material means to communicate with His people. I showed several examples to the contrary, including the quintessential example of the Incarnation, in which God the Word permanently became Man while remaining God. Christ ordained the material forms of bread and wine as the means of communion with His Incarnate body and blood which He gave for us on Calvary. I'm not sure how many other ways I can repeat this. In the Eucharist, the one sacrifice of Christ is made present in such a way that the bread and wine changes from being just common bread and wine to having both and earthly and a heavenly reality (as Irenaeus put it) as the bread and wine becomes His body and blood.

Even if that's the case, no one knew the specific details of fulfillments of these types (since they were vague) until this was revealed to them by the Apostles.

You point out, for instance, that the bread and wine was used in the Passover seder, but those two elements assumed the central focus in Christian worship because Christ revealed that this was to be the means of communion with His body and blood, a fact not mentioned in the OT.

Sure it was, because it was the name of the one who finally fulfilled the Old Covenant.

But once again you're assuming that just because the Apostles may not have ultimately written a certain detail down (or put a teaching in a specific way in writing) that they must have just "made it up off the top of their heads". You have failed to prove this, especially given the fact that not even everything that Jesus said and did was written down in the four gospels. (John 21:25). You have yet to demonstrate that the NT writings were meant to be an exhaustive compendium of everything that was ever taught by Christ to the Apostles and by them to the Church.

Many of those other books wouldn't have "passed" since they weren't authored by actual apostles. You assume that the canon was meant to be an all-inclusive encyclopedia of every Christian writing, whether or not it was written by an apostle as long as a writing mirrored (generally) apostolic tradition. However, it seems the Church's goal in setting limits to the NT canon was more modest--including those writings and only those writings which were authentically written by apostles or their very close associates (in the cases of Luke, Mark, Acts, and Hebrews)--no more (ie the spurious works of the gnostics claiming authorship; or even generally orthodox works not written by apostles) and no less (ie Marcion).

 

But that's what I mean when I say that you're overgeneralizing those things. I did not need all those lessons on how God could be manifest physically (which is why I thought you were using those a examples of "real presence". In studying God's dealings with the world, we see that all of those physical manifestations ceased with the final manifestation of the Logos as Christ. Now, we are in the dispensation of the Spirit, where God reveals Himself to us through the Spirit in us. I neverargued that God couldn't be manifest visibly. He just does not choose to do it now, because the New Testament (after Christ) is about the Spirit, and the Old Covenant was "fleshy", and more physical/visible oriented (the whole lesson is that that did not solve man's problem of sin). Now, you may try to liken this to gnosticism, but the problem with that ideology, is not a distinction between spirit and flesh at altogether, but that they go to an opposite extreme and overgeneralize it to making matter evil. Nothing I have said suggests any such thing. You have only arrived at that conclusion by overgeneralizing any distinction between physical and spiritual with any supremacy of the spiritual. It's not that matter is evil, but that God is a spirit, and to come into the truest contact with Him must be in the spiritual realm. What you are describing now is a spiritual reality, but you are still trying to attach some physical element as crucial to it, and using the past "physical manifestations" as examples, but they are not examples; only types. (Even the incarnation can be viewed as such in a way. God is now "incarnate" in us; still "physically manifest", but no longer external. It's people in the world who insist on visible signs of God (beyond the design in Creation), and don't realize that this never gave men more faith.

So now it does "change". That's what the RCC says, and now, the only difference seems to be that they say it is only flesh and blood, and you say it is both. Once again; if it is both; then the physical side of it can be said to be a symbol of the spiritual. Else; it appears that a separate "spiritual version" is "floating" beside it or residing in it, or whatever, which you deny.

Ypu keep talking "specific details", but I am not denying that the apostles could spell out the details of things not written in the OT. What we're discussing is whle new spins on concepts that you claim was included with this apostolic teaching, but consistantly left out of their writings. You cannot compare the Spirit-inspired apostles of Christ (most of whom directly saw Him, and were discipled by Him while on earth) interpreting the OT and teaching it orally and in writing; with postapostolic "fathers" interpreting the NT, and adding spins to it under the guise of this same "oral tradition" by which the apostles interpreted the OT. "apostolic sucession" did not carry with it "doctrinal inerrancy".
(And actually, there is a theory that the bread and wine was only used as an example in that instance because it was the Passover seder, and Christ was describing any meal the Church would have. This is evidenced by the fact that people cold not be "gluttonous" with little crackers and tiny vials. And Paul reitereated it because he was quoting Christ).

You're still assuming that there was some sort of separation of teachings, with one group included inthe writings, and the other left out; and that if we don't believe that, then we are making the NT "an exhaustive compendium of everything that was ever taught by Christ to the Apostles and by them to the Church". It is not an exhaustive compendium, but the same principles carry through. Just compare the gospels. Some include something left out by the others, and sometimes this is the same teaching put in other words. Sometime it maybe some particular act, but it still fits the principles seen elsewhere. So if we did not have one of the gospels we are familiar with, we would still have all the truths taught by it. Likewise, we have no reason to expect the rest of these "teachings not written" to be much different than anything we do read about.

You were claiming that "tradition" (i.e. teachings and practices) was the way that they knew a book was genuinely authored by an apostle in the first place. I assumed nothing of any "exhaustive encyclopedia of all Christian writings". But even if they only tried to limit it down to apostolic writings, if their teachings included "catholic" teachings, they they may have been taken as genuinely authored. Else, once again, this other body of teachings must have been deliberately excluded.

 

Now you are trying to have your cake and eat it too. On the one hand, you theoretically leave open the possibility that God can manifest himself visibly, but on the other hand you are quite confident that "He just does not choose to do it now" based on your assumptions about the differences the Old and New Covenants, assumptions which continue to have more in common with gnosticism than historic Christianity. The truth is that the New Covenant is based supremely on the fact that God became visible for our salvation--He became a visible man (like us), taking on a physical nature, and lived a visible, physical life, died a visible, physical death (which affected our spiritual and physical salvation) and visibly arose again. This was not to dispense with the visible/physical by any means, but was rather to redeem it. Therefore, to suggest that we are not to use visible means to attest to this truth or that God "doesn't choose" to use visible means to convey His Incarnational reality to us, but that rather the visible/physical was done away with (once Christ ascended) and is still (by the mere fact of it being visible/physical) irredeemably "fleshy", falls back into quasi-gnosticism.

Historic Christianity has affirmed both the Spirit coming upon the Church at Pentecost and indwelling believers and also the Christians communion with the Incarnate Christ in the Eucharist. It has also affirmed that Christ came to redeem the entire person--body and soul. It isn't "either/or".

But the invisible (to us) reality is not "floating" at all; it's anchored in history in Christ's once-for-all sacrifice. That's why one can call the bread and the wine "symbols", but only in the sense that the ancients used that word to mean a visible sign which actually makes present the invisible reality, or by which it is effected.

In regards, to specifics (or "mechanics") of the "change", the Orthodox Church has been content to leave it as a mystery rather than trying to define it in Aristotelian philosphical categories.

Of course there's nothing contradictory between what wasn't written and what was, but that then brings up the problem of the interpretation of what was actually written.

For instance, let's suppose (for the sake of argument) that Paul had said some other things in more detail about the Real Presence, perhaps not worded exactly the same as in 1 Corinthians yet consistent with what he meant in that passage. Now suppose that these different nuances--including the idea of "change"--were later written down by different orthodox church fathers. If then, a Lutheran or Anglican (or Orthodox or Catholic) look back and see these writings and compare them with what Paul wrote in Scripture, they would see complimentary ways of saying the same truth. However, if a Zwinglian were to do the comparison then he'd see contradiction, and would say: "Nope...look here--this church father says the elements "change", a word that Paul didn't specifically write in Corinthians. We know that Paul must have meant this merely metaphorically, so this must be where everyone got off track." However, the Zwinglian would be wrong in his assessment. The tradition would actually be agreeing with the scriptural "principle" but this fact would be denied by the Zwinglian, but affirmed by those who maintain the historical belief in the real presence.

OTOH, suppose for the sake of argument that Paul meant for the Eucharist to be interpreted in the Zwinglian sense and clarified this belief in statements outside of Scripture, perhaps in anticipation of future misunderstandings. One would expect that somewhere among the orthodox Christians that this view would be defended as the correct one, especially when other otherwise orthodox Christians started taking it too literally. Given the controversies on several other issues that brought out spirited defenses from the orthodox believers in the face of heresy one would think that there would be a statement somewhere to the fact that: "This Real Presence doctrine is a heresy! Don't you know this is the "dispensation of the Spirit" and that such emphasis on visible and physical things is just a fleshy vestige of the Old Covenant? Physical and visible things avail for nothing!" Yet not only do we not see any such repudiation of the Real Presence from orthodox Christians, but the place in which we do encounter beliefs such as these are in the teachings of the gnostic heretics. (Of course--one may argue that such defenses may have existed before vanishing without a trace, but then folks like the Mormons could also in such a manner argue from silence.)

So starting with different presuppositions about how the written Scriptures are interpreted, one comes to different conclusions of whether the patristic consensus is in agreement with the scriptural "principle" or whether they are in opposition. The fact is that there is no historical evidence for that these Zwinglian presuppositions existed among the otherwise orthodox christians until...Zwingli.

 

That's not true. It is not a total shunning of physical matter as if evil. As I have always said, just like in areas such as sexuality (which "catholic" churches led the way in making evil, based on gnostic influence, showing it was not free of such, though I don't know if the East was always as bad as the [Augustinian] West), the sin lies not in physical matter, but in man's soul. (Quite a reversal of the gnostic belief!) He tends to idolize physical things. God gave Israel a bunch of physical things in their worship, and we see where that went. So in this age; God focuses on the spirit. That is all that is really needed right now; not necessarily all that is "good".

I am speaking of worship now. This has nothing to do with our bodies.
God redeems our bodies through sanctification, though not completely, because we still have the sin nature. Complete redemption of the physical realm will be in the future kingdom, which the gnostics would deny (in fact, the whole idea of spirits floating up to Heaven without the body is from them!)

I'm not sure how different the ancient meaning of "symbol" is from our resent understanding. You say "anchored in history", but that still does not tell us the relationship of the spiritual reality to the physical items.

OK, but then keep in mind that "mystery" was one of the chief tactics of the gnostics. "Miracle, mystery and authority" is being recognized by some now as the long time tactic of corrupt religion to indoctrinate and control people. Just like the precise nature of the Trinity and Calvinistic arguments, we try to fully explain spiritual realities, beyond what the scripture says, and only when further questions arise THEN do we appeal to "mystery". But this comes from already going too far into the unexplainable.

You reject the idea that the change could creep in too gradually to raise such objections, but we se in the use of "symbol", that it is sometimes unclear what is meant. So if it sounds orthodox, people will accept it, until it crosses a line, but by then it may be toolate. This is like the frog in the pot. So "real presence" then becomes "transubstatiation", and at that point, the East digress to an earlier, simpler expression (and I'm sure they tolerated it for awhile before thre split), and later the Lutherans; and then Zwingli tries to take it back further to a SS expression.
Once again; I would say it was men and their "traditions" that started all the splintering in the first place, because then we got into the mindset that "the scriptures don't really have to explicitly say it", so everyone wanted their idea of the "apostolic tradition" passed off as the truth. The "Ont Church" supressed the splintering with its power for centuries, but couldn't keep it down forever.

Anyway, we should not speculate too much on these "other teachings", and assume they included "more detail" that was left out. God has preserved for us the most important details of the basic faith, and we can try to appeal to "apostolic tradition", and question whether that would "end" with a written canon, and then go on to link it to "patristic consensus"; but on the flipside, we can ask whoever said that the tradition was for those, beyond the period of time when the writings were not widely published? You can ask one question like that, and we can ask another, and it is all speculation. You are asking us to have faith, basically in what these "fathers" said. Setting aside whether we are even interpreting them completely right, they were still not pure in apostolic teaching. Antisemitis is another area where they took scriptural teachings and stretched them into unscriptural extremes. There were a lot of criticisms of the Jews int he NT, but the fathers took it beyond that, to where the tables were turned, and they were nowlooked at as the "dogs" (like they looked at gentiles in the NT).
And false groups may try to use the claim that opposition was buried, but that does not mean that there could not have been some opposition buried. None of us were there back then. We can only know by what was preserved for us. There are three sources preserved for us: Canonized scripture, patristic tradition, and spurious works. The first agreeable true. The latter agreeably false,as it sometimes blatantly contradicts the first. The second one
based on interpretations of the first, that may or may not be true, and we cannot know for sure. Only the first is without question to us. So instead of asking us to have faith in these men and their traditions (interpretations) and their "mysteries"; why not just go back to the God-breathed source that we all agree is from God, and have faith that God preserved all of His necessary truths in them? You cound't go wrong that way. even if people continue to ptiwst it to multiple interpretations (which they could do even more with an "oral tradition" anyway).

 

How do you know that Zwingli took "it back further to a SS expression"? ISTM that, far from returning to a Scriptural description of the sacraments, Zwingli erred in attempting to interpret the Latin 'sacramentum', which in itself originally meant a military oath or pedge of allegiance and was therefore a poor translation of the Greek &mu;&upsilon;&sigma;&tau;&eta;&rho;&iota;&omicron;&nu; , as being merely symbolic, based on its original Latin sense rather than the above original Greek word; in so doing, he broke with the continuity of the Church's understanding of the term which streched back to the ECFs and Apostles (Ignatius and John in particular).

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

"Musterion" means simply "secret". In its 27 uses, it is never used for "some teaching we can't comprehend" (the closest to that would be the "mystery" of "God...manifest in the flesh" (1 Tim.3:16), but even that is more about the revelation of Christ, than the metaphysical question of Him being human and divine), but instead, in most cases, the "secret" was in the process of being revealed, or already revealed (and remaining hidden from those blinded).
So Zwingli's understanding was closer to the true meaning of the word, and thus the Apostles who used the word. It was a later church with an agenda of control that changed the meaning of the word, so that no one could challenge their teachings.

BTW, Matt, are you a Baptist who is converting to the EOC or some other "catholic" group too?

 

I currently go to a Baptist church but have become aware over the last 6 months or so of the deficiencies of that tradition, particularly ecclesiologically and generally theologically (trawl through the last 6 months on this forum for a flavour). Whilst I would perhaps baulk at the EOC or Catholic Church, I would I think feel more at home in, how can I put it, a more Magisterial rather than Radical Reformation tradition, such as Anglicanism. I'm still contemplating my future though ATM and asking for the Lord's guidance - would appreciate your prayers.

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

I think this whole thread says a LOT about the changes in the Baptist Church.

The vast majority of new Mormons and new Anglicans are former Baptists.

Those I speak to give the following reasons:

1) Baptists don't care about people anymore, and ignore Christ.
2) Baptists give lipservice to the commandments, while pointing fingers at other denominations, but then "accept" the same things the other denominations accept. (Classes for the divorced, classes for homosexuals, etc.)