Catholic Myths: Canon and Authority

Below is an excerpt from Catholic Answers which provides a fictitious conversation between a Catholic and a Protestant - a training tool for Catholics. This article displays the true intent behind the whole canon argument for the Catholic apologetists/e-pologists (as I mentioned previously, it is all about bringing you under submission to Rome) and is why so many Catholic e-pologists won't let this one go.

Here the missionary will fumble around awhile, perhaps repeating his earlier statements. Then you say:

"Look, the fact is, the only reason you and I have the New Testament canon is because of the trustworthy teaching authority of the Catholic Church. As Augustine put it, ‘I would not believe in the Gospels were it not for the authority of the Catholic Church’ (Against the Letter of Mani Called "The Foundation" 5:6). Any Christian accepting the authority of the New Testament does so, whether or not he admits it, because he has implicit trust that the Catholic Church made the right decision in determining the canon."

"...Furthermore, the reason you accept the books you do is that they were in the Bible someone gave you when you first became a Christian. You accept them because they were handed on to you. This means you accept the canon of the New Testament that you do because of tradition, because tradition is simply what is handed on to us from those who were in the faith before us. So your knowledge of the exact books that belong in the Bible, such as Philemon and 3 John, rests on tradition rather than on Scripture itself!"

"The question you have to ask yourself is this: ‘Where did we get the Bible?’ Until you can give a satisfactory answer, you aren’t in much of a position to rely on the authority of Scripture or to claim that you can be certain that you know how to accurately interpret it."

"After you answer that question—and there’s really only one answer that can be given—you have some other important questions to ask: ‘If the Bible, which we received from the Catholic Church, is our sole rule of faith, who’s to do the interpreting?’ And ‘Why are there so many conflicting understandings among Evangelicals and Fundamentalists even on central doctrines that pertain to salvation?’" Catholic Answers

I will try to address the breakdown in this argument in a future post.

Early Church Father on Sola Scriptura

'God alone swears securely, because He alone is infallible.'
Augustine, Exp on Psalm 89

'[H]e will find there in much greater abundance things that are to be found nowhere else, but can be learnt only in the wonderful sublimity and wonderful simplicity of the Scriptures'
Augustine, De Doctr. Christ. 2,42,63

'Therefore let God-inspired Scripture decide between us; and on whichever side be found doctrines in harmony with the word of God, in favor of that side will be cast the vote of truth'
Basil, Ep. Ad Eustathius

'For concerning the divine and holy mysteries of the Faith, not even a casual statement must be delivered without the Holy Scriptures; nor must we be drawn aside by mere plausibility and artifices of speech. Even to me, who tell you these things, give not absolute credence, unless thou receive the proof of the things which I announce from the Divine Scriptures. For this salvation which we believe depends not on ingenious reasoning, but on demonstration of the Holy Scriptures.' Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lecture 4

God and His Word

In Scripture, the person of God and the Word of God are everywhere interrelated, so much so that whatever is true about the character of God is true about the nature of God's Word. God is true, impeccable, and reliable; therefore, so is His Word. What a person thinks about God's Word, in reality, reflects what a person thinks about God.

-John MacArthur

Luther on Sola Scriptura

In the comment section of the post Catholic Fallacies: Private Interpretation, John (jswranch) made the following comment:

We Catholics are not the only ones claiming this chaos in Sola Scriptura. Just look at the words of Luther:

“There are almost as many sects and beliefs as there are heads; this one will not admit baptism; that one rejects the Sacrament of the altar; another places another world between the present one and the day of judgment; some teach that Jesus Christ is not God. There is not an individual, however clownish he may be, who does not claim to be inspired by the Holy Ghost, and who does not put forth as prophecies his ravings and dreams.”

I wasn’t buying John’s use of this quote so I searched around for the original quote in context but was unsuccessful. I asked James Swan of Beggars All Reformation, who is the online Luther expert, if he was familiar with the quote.

With his usual excellence in getting quotes and context correct, James has posted an in-depth look at this quote. I am including just some excerpts here, you really must read James’ post in it’s entirety:

“When checking these obscure Luther quotes used by Roman Catholics, the first thing to remember, most often, they didn’t get them by reading Luther in context. Often, they’ve pulled these quotes from secondary sources.”

James was able to track down the actual quote in context in a letter by Luther:

“We believed, during the reign of the pope, that the spirits which make a noise and disturbance in the night, were those of the souls of men, who after death, return and wander about in expiation of their sins. This error, thank God, has been discovered by the Gospel, and it is known at present, that they are not the souls of men, but nothing else than those malicious devils who used to deceive men by false answers. It is they that have brought so much idolatry into the world.

The devil seeing that this sort of disturbance could not last, has devised a new one; and begins to rage in his members, I mean in the ungodly, through whom he makes his way in all sorts of chimerical follies and extravagant doctrines. This won't have baptism, that denies the efficacy of the Lord's supper; a third, puts a world between this and the last judgment ; others teach that Jesus Christ is not God ; some say this, others that ; and there are almost as many sects and beliefs as there are heads.” - Letter of doctor Martin to the Christians of Antwerp.

Finally, James notes:

“First, it should be obvious the quote is being used out of context. Luther isn’t talking about the devastating effect of sola scriptura. He’s talking about the devastating effect of the devil, who, Luther says, was at peace in his papal fortress, but now with the gospel being loudly proclaimed, must find a different way to keep men enslaved to sin and darkness.”

The rest of James' article goes on to make some excellent points about the need for an infallible interpreter of scripture (as Catholics claim). As this topic was also brought up in the comment section of the post on private revelation, I hope to address this topic more thoroughly in a future post. Again, make sure you read James' full post as he has alot of interesting information there.

John (jswranch), I know how much you love to quote Luther but unfortunately you will have to cross this particular quote out of your play book. And while you are updating your playbook, you may also want to check out James’ “Luther Myths” posts listed in my sidebar.

Response to Canon Comments

I would like to do some posts on Sola Scriptura and the canon as Catholic e-pologists promote false statements about these things, but don’t have the time right now to give it the proper attention.

For now I will just refute a few of the comments made here regarding these topics:

The Church was founded in 33 AD. While the apostles and disciples were spreading the faith throughout the world, they began to write. The Church finished writing the bible in about 100 AD, and the Church finally decided which books belonged in about 397AD. jswranch

Long before Jerome assembled the first Bible, timothy

When I look at Church history I find councils of Bishops at Hippo and Ephesus deciding these matters. timothy


Wrong. The Roman Catholic canon was not decided until the Council of Trent in 1546.

“The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council.” Catholic Encyclopedia

The fact is, the canon of the old testament remained in dispute through the years before Trent made its decision. Jerome was strongly against the idea of the deuterocanonicals as inspired scripture (those 7 books Luther supposedly through out of Protestant bibles) as were other members of the early church such as Origen, Athanasius, Cyril, and Epiphanius and others.

The doubts about the OT canon continued through the middle ages.

“In the Latin Church, all through the Middle Ages we find evidence of hesitation about the character of the deuterocanonicals. There is a current friendly to them, another one distinctly unfavourable to their authority and sacredness, while wavering between the two are a number of writers whose veneration for these books is tempered by some perplexity as to their exact standing, and among those we note St. Thomas Aquinas. Few are found to unequivocally acknowledge their canonicity. The prevailing attitude of Western medieval authors is substantially that of the Greek Fathers. The chief cause of this phenomenon in the West is to be sought in the influence, direct and indirect, of St. Jerome's depreciating Prologus. The compilatory "Glossa Ordinaria" was widely read and highly esteemed as a treasury of sacred learning during the Middle Ages; it embodied the prefaces in which the Doctor of Bethlehem had written in terms derogatory to the deuteros, and thus perpetuated and diffused his unfriendly opinion.” Catholic Encyclopedia

The Roman Catholic canon was not ratified until 1546 at Trent, the time of the Reformation (not at Hippo or Ephesus as Timothy and jswranch tried to claim). The Protestant Bible is compatible with Jerome’s (and others) view of the OT canon, while the Catholic Bible is not.

We can debate over who currently has the correct canon, but the fact remains that the Catholic Church did not give the world the Bible back in 397AD.

Whose Book Is It?

In discussions here about Catholicism and on other blogs/forums that I visit, it never seems too long in a discussion with a Roman Catholic before the following statement is made in some form or other: “The Catholic Church gave you your Bible”.

No matter how many times I hear it, it still makes me cringe. Not only is the statement inaccurate, but the arrogance that often permeates that statement makes me fearful for the person saying it. I wonder if any Catholic would dare say such a thing when standing before the judgment seat.

From the Catholic Encyclopedia:

It will be seen, therefore, that though the inspiration of any writer and the sacred character of his work be antecedent to its recognition by the Church yet we are dependent upon the Church for our knowledge of the existence of this inspiration. She is the appointed witness and guardian of revelation. From her alone we know what books belong to the Bible.

(Church = Roman Catholic Church, not the invisible body of believers)

Actually, that statement is pretty mild compared to what I have heard out of the mouths of laypeople, but misleading nonetheless.

As I have time I will search around for some of the comments I have seen online that have made me shudder…but in the meantime let me just clear up the general confusion. God wrote the Bible, it is HIS book.


Example comments:

“The church came before the bible. The church wrote the bible, then the church decided which books belong based on tradition.” source

“I'm not sure why you laugh when the Catholic Church gave the Bible to the world.” source

“As I and others have often said, the Catholic Church did not come out of the Bible; rather, the Bible came out of the Catholic Church! Jesus didn't leave us an instruction book; He left us a Church as our teacher. The Church produced the Bible and is its only rightful interpreter.” source

Early Church Fathers on Sola Scriptura

Irenaeus (ca. 150)
Against Heresies 3.1.1
“We have learned from none others the plan of our salvation, than from those through whom the gospel has come down to us, which they did at one time proclaim in public, and, at a later period, by the will of God, handed down to us in the Scriptures, to be the ground and pillar of our faith.”

Clement of Alexandria (d. 215)
The Stromata, 7:16
“But those who are ready to toil in the most excellent pursuits, will not desist from the search after truth, till they get the demonstration from the Scriptures themselves.”

Gregory of Nyssa (d.ca, 395)
“On the Holy Trinity”, NPNF, p. 327
“Let the inspired Scriptures then be our umpire, and the vote of truth will be given to those whose dogmas are found to agree with the Divine words.”

Athanasius (c. 296–373)
Against the Heathen, 1:3
“The holy and inspired Scriptures are fully sufficient for the proclamation of the truth.”

Basil the Great (ca.329–379)
On the Holy Spirit, 7.16
“We are not content simply because this is the tradition of the Fathers. What is important is that the Fathers followed the meaning of the Scripture.”

Ambrose (340–397 A.D.)
On the Duties of the Clergy, 1:23:102
“For how can we adopt those things which we do not find in the holy Scriptures?”

St. Augustine (354–430)
De unitate ecclesiae, 10
“Neither dare one agree with catholic bishops if by chance they err in anything, but the result that their opinion is against the canonical Scriptures of God.”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274)
Summa Theologiae, Question 1, art. 8
“For our faith rests on the revelation made to the Prophets and Apostles who wrote the canonical books.”

Thanks to Reformed Rants for this list.