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Is the Bible properly described as "The Word of God"?

Discussion in 'Other Christian Denominations' started by Matt Black, Jan 30, 2009.

  1. Thinkingstuff

    Thinkingstuff Active Member

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    Matt, the Christians during the time of the Apostles did not have a Gideons, NIV, NRSV, or KJB. Nor was the NT written ( It was being written). Oral Tradition is how the Christian faith was transmitted from the Apostles to the early church and they supplimented their oral tradition with supports from the OT. That is just history. Its a fact. The word of God originally passed is the teaching of the Apostles which was initially passed orally before it was written. Simple, plain, and not debatable. :tongue3:
     
  2. Jerome

    Jerome Well-Known Member
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    Exod. 24:4
    And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel.

    II Chron. 34:21
    Go, enquire of the LORD for me, and for them that are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book that is found: for great is the wrath of the LORD that is poured out upon us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the LORD, to do after all that is written in this book.

    Jer. 36:8
    And Baruch the son of Neriah did according to all that Jeremiah the prophet commanded him, reading in the book the words of the LORD in the LORD'S house.
     
  3. gb93433

    gb93433 Active Member
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    A good book on your point is Memory and Manuscript: Oral Tradition and Written Transmission in Rabbinic Judaism and Early Christianity : With Tradition and Transmission in Early Christianity by Birger Gerhardsson
     
  4. Marcia

    Marcia Active Member

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    2 Tim 3:16

    Also, Jesus referring to the OT as God's word. Jesus saying in the Gospels, "I say unto you," is giving God's word.

    The canon we use now was used by the earliest Christians as God's word - it was treated as such. Peter refers to writings of Paul as scripture.

    On what basis would you exclude certain portions if you would? Are you wondering if all the Bible is God's word?
     
  5. Matt Black

    Matt Black Well-Known Member
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    I'm not really wondering anything. I'm after definitions. The Bible being God's Word is not a problem for me because I'm not sola Scriptura - I believe that both Scripture and Tradition are God's Word because they self-reference as such. But I think it's more problematic if you're sola Scriptura simply because there isn't a proof-text that says "Scripture=Word of God", and thus Scripture alone is not self-referencing on the definition point.
     
  6. gb93433

    gb93433 Active Member
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    Tradition is an application of what the particular people thought Christianity to be and their responsibility to the God they think they know. Initially oral tradition was the method of passing down parts of scripture until it was written. Other parts of scripture were written from the start.
     
  7. Matt Black

    Matt Black Well-Known Member
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    So, would you agree with me, then, that Apostolic Tradition can also properly be called "The Word of God"?
     
  8. Thinkingstuff

    Thinkingstuff Active Member

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    All that does is establish the Torah. Not the Majority of the OT nor the NT.
     
  9. Thinkingstuff

    Thinkingstuff Active Member

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    I would agree with that but there is question of when Apostolic Tradition cease (if indeed it did) to be in the Classical Christian Churches and became something more under the same term Apostolic Tradition. Did the Classical Churches ever veared off course from the Apostolic tradition? Did Oral Tradition cease to be once the NT was canonized or before (if before when?)? Did the NT leave out aspects of Apostolic Tradition (if so what? and how to prove it?)? These questions are acutally more appropiate because Paul preached Jesus and him crusified before the "bible" was completed so his words preached (and supported by the OT) would be the word of God (or at least the inspired verbal component of it if you get my meaning). You would have to say Peter's first sermon recorded in Acts to be the word of God and that would be considered Oral Tradition or Apostolic Tradition.
     
  10. Eric B

    Eric B Active Member
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    I see oral tradition as just a mode of communication, not a separate body of teaching kept out of writing (so that the later church could justify all sorts of doctrine and practices not found in the scriptures).
    And that's why people go straight back to the scriptures, which come from the source of the stream (inspired apostolic writers; which would be the "purest"), and not later church's interpretation of stuff handed down. (and we have to trust THEM, that they got it right, and they don't even claim to be inspired!)
     
  11. Matt Black

    Matt Black Well-Known Member
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    But you still have the problem of interpretation if, by ad fontes, you mean the Scriptures alone, divorced from Apostolic Tradition.
     
  12. swaimj

    swaimj <img src=/swaimj.gif>

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    What is in apostolic tradition that we do not find in the content of the Old and New Testaments?
     
  13. Pastor David

    Pastor David Member
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    II Tim 3:16 states the "Scriptures" are "God-breathed". For all intents and purposes this as strong, or arguably stronger, case for saying the Scriptures are the Word of God than anything else. Paul was using the emphasis of God's breath in order to stress the fact that the Scriptrues equate to the very Word of God.

    BTW, there is a great deal of traditon to support this view.

    Blessings,
     
  14. THEOLDMAN

    THEOLDMAN New Member

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    Did Paul know his "letters "would end up included as "scripture" when he wrote them ?
     
  15. Pastor David

    Pastor David Member
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    Here are the words of a well-respected commentator, who puts it far more eloquently than I ever could. Remarking on II Tim 3:16 he writes,

    "That is, all holy Scripture; for of that only the apostle is speaking; and he means the whole of it; not only the books of the Old Testament, but of the New, the greatest part of which was now written; for this second epistle to Timothy is by some thought to be the last of Paul's epistles; and this also will hold good of what was to be written; for all is inspired by God, or breathed by him: the Scriptures are the breath of God, the word of God and not men; they are "written by the Spirit", as the Syriac version renders it; or "by the Spirit of God", as the Ethiopic version.

    The Scriptures are here commended, from the divine authority of them; and which is attested and confirmed by various arguments; as the majesty and loftiness of their style, which in many places is inimitable by men; the sublimity of the matter contained in them, which transcends all human understanding and capacity ever to have attained unto and discovered; as the trinity of persons in the Godhead, the incarnation of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, &c. The purity and holiness of them before observed, show them to be the word of him that is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity; as also their harmony and agreement, though wrote by different persons, in different places, and ages, and at sundry times, and in divers manners; what seeming inconsistencies are observed in them may, with labour and industry, by divine assistance, be reconciled.

    The predictions of future events in them, as particularly concerning Josiah and Cyrus, by name, long before they were born, and especially concerning Jesus Christ, and which have had their accomplishment, and many others in the New Testament both by Christ and his apostles, are a proof that they could not be the writings of men, but must have the omniscient God for their author; the impartiality of the writers of them, in not concealing the mean extract of some of them, the sins of others before conversion, and even their sins and failings afterwards, as well as those of their nearest relations and dearest friends, strengthens the proof of their divine authority; to which may be added, the wonderful preservation of them, through all the changes and declensions of the Jewish church and state, to whom the books of the Old Testament were committed; and notwithstanding the violence and malice of Heathen persecutors, particularly Dioclesian, who sought to destroy every copy of the Scriptures, and published an edict for that purpose, and notwithstanding the numbers of heretics, and who have been in power, as also the apostasy of the church of Rome; and yet these writings have been preserved, and kept pure and incorrupt, which is not the case of other writings; nor are there any of such antiquity as the oldest of these: to which may be subjoined the testimony of God himself; his outward testimony by miracles, wrought by Moses and the prophets, concerned in the writings of the Old Testament, and by the apostles in the New; and his internal testimony, which is the efficacy of these Scriptures on the hearts of men; the reading and hearing of which, having been owned for the conversion, comfort and edification of thousands and thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand."

    Blessings,
     
  16. Marcia

    Marcia Active Member

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    Then if you believe Tradition is also God's word, how is Tradition determined? Is it passed down in a certain church and only that church?

    This makes no sense to me because anything God wanted us to know is written in the Bible; it's clear and easy to find. Just because there is disagreement on some interpretation, the essentials of what is being taught are clear. Believers are united in faith in the same Jesus Christ. Somehow, it all works despite our differences.
     
  17. Matt Black

    Matt Black Well-Known Member
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    Plenty! Clarification of baptismal practices, Sunday services (nowhere in the NT is this prescribed) including who presides, ecclesiology (Tradition settles the congregational -v- presbyterian -v- episcopal modes which can all be argued from the pages of the NT firmly in favour of the episcopal method of church government), the meaning and nature of the Eucharist, etc etc

    [ETA - Marcia, in answer to your question, I did post a thread entitled 'Scripture and Tradition' last year delaing with this very topic which I can't find right now in the archive, although it is saved to my computer so am happy to post relevant excerpts here if you wish. In the meantime, your starter for ten on the subject: ever heard of Vincent of Lerins and his 'Canon'?]
     
    #77 Matt Black, Feb 6, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 6, 2009
  18. Thinkingstuff

    Thinkingstuff Active Member

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    It says all scripture and the ECF quoted from the LXX as does the other author of Hebrews and Jude. Which brings up oral tradition with respect to canon.
     
  19. swaimj

    swaimj <img src=/swaimj.gif>

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    Which apostle clarified baptismal practices? Where can I find this?

    Which apostle clarified the matter od Sunday services? Where can I find this?

    Which apostle clarified the Eucharist? Which apostle ever even used the word "eucharist"? Where can I find this?

    It seems you are assuming an apostolic succession that goes beyond the original 12 apostles and Paul, the apostle to the gentiles.
     
  20. Matt Black

    Matt Black Well-Known Member
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    Yes, I am. Sorry if that wasn't made clear; it's implicit in the term 'Apostolic Tradition'.
     
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