Scripture and Tradition

Nobody cares what your opinion is in regard to Early Church writings, obviously your against them because they don’t reflect your traditions…all you can do is appeal to Scripture, which is fine, but in the harsh reality of it all, you’re no different than the other thousands of protestant denominations that appeal to the same Scriptures as do you, yet doctrinally are vastly different.

The whole jest of this thread is Scripture and Tradition…even though you may can point to a particular passage of Scripture(s) and base your sects doctrine off of, doesn’t say anything about what was practiced by the Baptist Church after the close of the New Testament…all you can do DHK is “assume” that just b/c you believe and teach it today in the year 2008 AD, the early Church believed and taught it in the year 150 AD were thus “Baptist”.

You said you can back-up your assumptions…so take us through roughly 2,000 years of “Baptist” Church History…show us, her Fathers and their writings, show us the Baptist Fathers that looked Martyrdom in the face of a lion and gave their lives for the faith of the Apostles?

If you can’t, then you can’t back-up your assumptions…period…

Sorry DHK, but it was YOU who made the claim to be able to "back-up" your assumptions and now you're going to define the rules of war that'll give you the advantage. What I ask of you is not anything absured, just a simple outline of Baptist History starting from the Apostles...is that too much to ask?

ICXC NIKA
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1. Schaff has written six tomes on church history.
2. Thomas Armitage has written two large volumes on Baptist History.
Those are just two of many, many sources. A course of this nature takes a year, and you expect me to condense it to a few posts. I don't think so.
3. I reiterate: Our church does not have "tradition." Try naming some. You have some exposure with Baptist churches. What would you consider "tradition" in Baptist churches? Ours is not a liturgical church, as you probably know. That in itself would exclude much of what people call "tradition." So what is left? What traditions do we have other than adhering to the Word of God?

What did the early church do?
Acts 2:42 And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.
Acts 2:46 And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart,

What things changed over time?
They were kicked out of the Temple and eventually the synagogues. Salvation was extended to the Gentiles, and it took more than 200 years after that that Christians had buildings that were exclusively set apart for the sole purpose of worshiping God.

After a while (as evidenced in Acts 20:7) they began to meet on the first day of the week, not necessarily every day of the week. That was another change.

However what was important: doctrine, fellowship, the Lord's Supper, and prayer. That is still what we consider important today.

 

As far as the "church father" stuff, Catholics, Baptists, church history, etc..

For the most part, Baptist practice and religious tenets are taken from what the New Testament-era church wrote. For the most part, the appearances of most Catholic traditions can be traced to appearing at various times since then.

How do we decide who a `church father' is? How do we decide who should be considered an authority, and when? How do we decide which portions of their writings to be bound by?

The Baptists, and similar denominations, are doing nothing other than building their doctrines and congregation practice around what has been present since the times the Lord's Personal apostles were overseeing the church.

From my perspective, because Catholic aberrations pop into appearance at various times since then, I believe the burden is on anyone who would suggest that these are important -- when the Lord's Personal apostles did not show any knowledge of them.

I believe it is much more sound to stick with what was written in the church overseen by the Lord's Personal apostles. So while Baptist history may not extend to antiquity, what they base what they do on, was extant in the earliest age of the church.

 

So what of the Apostolic Church Fathers who studied at the very feet of the Apostles of our Lord? Do they have no credit?

Who in your opinion who would have understood what the Apostles taught in regard to Baptism or the Lord’s Supper? The Apostolic/Early Church Fathers of some late Reformer 1,500 years removed?

It’s obviously that today’s Protestantism can't decipher what the Apostles meant in their Letters and Epistles, hence we can learn a lot from the men who walked with and studied under the direction of the Apostles….even the President of the US needs a Press Secretary to explain to the people what the President says or writes…

Hard for me to believe that the Church fell into error right off the bat at the close of the NT in light of the promises Christ made to His Church and His Apostles He sent out...

Granted after the schism between the Western Church and the Eastern Church of 1054 we gradually over hundreds of years begin to see in the West doctrinal errors creep into the Western Church's theological thought, but by and large the Early Churches that were centered around the five great ecclesiastical centers of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem all shared in the unity of the faith.

ICXC NIKA
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Not as much as the apostles and other writers whose writings they affirmed.

It gets less authoritative as we get to `sat at the feet of ___ who sat at the feet of __ who sat at the feet of' etc..

This is assuming that all of the early church leaders did actually `sit at the feet' of an apostle. Polycarp was a student of John, and his epistle shows a viewpoint that is much more similar to New Testament thought than modern Catholicism or Orthodoxy.

Depends on their attitude about what the apostles actually taught.

An early writer who wanted to `do his own thing' would be less reliable than a Reformer who sits down with the writings of the apostles' time to learn their teachings.

So, Catholic authorities are able to any better? I do not buy it.

It is easy for me to believe. I see the effects.

As for Orthodoxy and Catholicism, both Orthodox and Catholic polemicists are prone to assert the authority of the church over Scripture. Why? The disparities force them to do so.

Now, Jesus Christ told the apostles that the Spirit would lead them into all truth in John 16. He did not tell them that the Spirit would tell them the answer to every single religious curiosity later church leaders came up with.

Matthew 16:15-8 teaches that Christ would build His church, and that it would prevail. The Greek word translated "church" refers to a collective of people. Christ never said that this collective of His followers would always have leaders who never go wrong. He said that His collective of followers would prevail.

After 1054, how would we know which "Tradition" to follow? Catholic polemicists say we should all follow theirs at the expense of the other, and Orthodox polemicists say we should follow theirs at the expense of the other. I believe they are both partially right: neither Orthodox Tradition nor Catholic Tradition should be followed for authority.

I simply go to the writings of the church led by the Lord Jesus Christ's Personal apostles.

As for "unity of faith," all Christians share unity of faith: we believe that Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior, and that His teachings should be followed. We may not all want to accept that, but we all share a common faith.

 

You exaggerate. How many writings do you have of those whom you know for sure studied at the feet of the Apostles, I mean directly at the feet of the Apostles--not a century or two later. When you narrow it down, you have almost nothing.

Who is more authoritative: the ECF or the Reformers? Neither one. And I don't use either one? Why bring these former Catholics into this equation? I have nothing to do with them. I am not a reformer nor am I a Protestant. I read their writings as much as I read the ECF writings, which means very little.

I made my point already. I agree. The Reformers disagreed among themselves. Some of them even killed over some points of doctrine. Those were terrible times. Calvin established his own state-church in Geneva just like the Catholics had in many countries, and eventually England had the Church of England (Anglican) as their church state. Each state-church became a persecuting church.
I put my faith in the Word of God (sola scriptura) not in the words of men.

Read it in the Bible. Jesus spoke of it. Paul spoke of it. Jude spoke of it. John spoke of it. Peter spoke of it. There was plenty of false teachers in the time of Christ and of the Apostles. Why do you think that there was no error when Christ himself says that there was? Was Christ also in error?

When Christianity was made a state-religion by Constantine then Christianity became paganized and paganism became Christianized, and thus began the RCC in the fourth century, although some of its man-made doctrines and heresies had been lurking around for some time before that.

 

This reminded me of some things.

One thing I remember was 3 John. In it, an individual church leader was seeking preeminence. He was even vocal and adamant in opposition to John's authority. Evidently, his congregation went along with it.

It is evident that not everyone intended to obey the Lord's apostles while they were alive, let alone dead.

Second, I remember Titus 3:8-11, which tells Christians to focus on doing good deeds. It tells us to "shun foolish questionings" (ASV) unrelated to this, and tells us to reject a "factious man" who seeks to create factions over these.

1 Timothy 6:3-4 warns of people who would want to preach a different doctrine than "sound words, those or our Lord Jesus Christ" (NASB), and the doctrine about "a godly life" (NLT 1996). He said of such a person "he is conceited and understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in |disputes" (NASB|NKJV).

1 Timothy 1:3-7 has within it "But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. For some men, straying from these things, have turned aside to fruitless discussion" (NASB). 2 Timothy 2:23 says “refuse foolish and ignorant speculations, knowing that they produce quarrels” (NASB).

Paul knew people were wanting to get into speculations while he was still alive. Paul urged his closest church leaders to oppose this. He knew it was coming. 1900+ years' worth of religious speculations later, we see the results.

Catholics can study all their lives and still probably not get a an exhaustive understanding of all the religious tenets of Catholicism unless they are lifelong clergy or academicians. Orthodoxy does not seem to be much better. We have hundreds of far-simpler denominations which define themselves by religious tenets expected to be believed among members.

We also see quarrels between those who consider it a priority that everyone agree with their groups on these religious speculations. They put this priority beneath our common loyalty to Christ, and beneath our common duty to follow His teachings doing what is good.

So yeah. The Lord's apostles did not assume everything would go well after their decease. They had good reason to worry.

 

Does the truth hurt Matt? You don't like to see the truth of history posted, but only the rose colored revisionist history of the RCC? How convenient! It's nice to have your own version of history where one can block out the Inquistion as if nothing ever happened, but we know that is not true. There are still holocaust deniers among us too. But truth is truth, no matter how much one denies it.

 

GE
There's a lot of tradition - extra-Biblical - in what you have here stated virtually like a confession of faith, DHK, mentioned and implied!

 

Do you understand Greek?

If anyone can say that the NT quoted the Septuagint, then every word of the sentence must be the same exactly. Bible is not a novel as many Roman Catholics think !
And NT quotes are so much different, and the meanings are changed as well.

Show me any verse of NT quoting OT, then I will disprove the Hoax of LXX quotation in NT !

 

Nothing in scripture at all about baptism of infants.

In all cases in scripture those who "HEAR the word" then "RECEIVE the word" and are baptized.

There is no "dunk 'em and then later tell them what that was all about" message in scripture. No not even one!

Hint - this one can't even be won with the extra-biblical arguments - but that is another thread.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Funny -- but makes no argument at all against the Acts 17:11 case where EVEN WITHOUT the NT writings the saints of the NT were able to TEST the words of Paul "studying the scriptures daily to SEE IF those things spoken to them by Paul WERE SO".

This is not the 66 books of scripture being used -- the 66 that the traditionalists today say "are INSUFFICIENT" to test doctrine against -- this is JUST 39 of that 66 showing us that EVEN THAT is "SUFFICIENT" and adding 27 MORE does not make them "suddenly insufficient" - much as the traditionalists would have hoped for that result.

in Christ,

Bob

 

If you are "suggesting" that Christ's teaching in Matt 5-7 can be "refuted" or "shown to be in error" using the OT -- please do so.

What I find is complete harmony there.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Wrong question.

The correct question is "based on your response in support of sola scriptura methods EVEN in the case of testing the Words of Christ in the Beattitudes against the OT -- how do you apply the test of scripture against BAPTIST practices in the Lord's Supper and Baptism? Does scripture support that Baptist practice or refute it?"

It makes no sense to observe that DHK is supporting a sola-scriptura argument in favor of the Beattitudes and then say that based on that acceptance of sola-scriptura he should abandon it and defend Baptist practices against early church traditions.

in Christ,

Bob

 

In Gal 1:6-11 Paul argues "Though WE or an ANGEL from HEAVEN should bring to you a different gospel OTHER than what has been given -- let them be accursed".

Paul does not argue "if you hear it from me just accept it - but if it comes from someone else you have to test it".

We see the author of the book of Acts commending the Bereans for NOT simply accepting Paul's Word but for testing it against scripture AND then accepting it as teaching that is validated against scripture.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Bob,

And isnt it so amazing. Here we are 2000 years later, and we have the same scriptures, and the same Holy Spirit, and the same admonition from God, and...it...still...works...so...beautifully!

Praise God! \o/

Mike

 

Agnus Dei,

Did their writings end up as scripture? No? Theres your answer. Anything that they wrote is to be tested against the scriptures, and rejected if it is contradicted. It may very well be interesting reading, but it is not in any way authoritative, or a source of doctrine.

The Apostles themselves. We have their writings. They are called "epistles".

Neither. The scriptures.

Ummm....we've been doing it succesfully for a looooong time, Agnus. It would be very good for you to take your head out of the hole in the ground its been in.

Very foolish to turn interpreters rather than the writings themselves that they are interpreting.

The President is not Almighty God. And the standard for our country is the written documents that are the basis for our government. The Declaration of Independance, Bill or Rights, State laws, local laws, etc etc.

We are told that there were savage wolves and decievers in the midst of the flock before the scriptures were even completed.

And His promises include this...

We turn to the tradition of mere men, ANY mere men, to our peril...

Mike