[quote]Mr. Chen wrote:
It’s an interesting list. Don’t misunderstand me to say I think Peter wasn’t important, just not the leader.
Let me ask you about a couple of these:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote: Peter is specified by an angel as the leader of the apostles.
[/quote] Where is this from?
[/quote]
Mark 16:7
Yes, no other apostle healed like this. Although a handkerchief Paul had used could be carried to someone and used to heal them. Also impressive.
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:Acts 15: Peter resolves the first doctrinal issue:circumcision at the first council at Jerusalem. No one questions him. Only after Peter speaks do Paul and Barnabas speak in support of Peter’s definitive teaching. James then speaks to acknolwedge Peter’s teaching, "Peter has related how God first visited…
[/quote]
You have no reason to say Peter resolved the issue, especially in light of the “sentence” of James.[/quote]
Yes, there is plenty of reasons.
No, but the fact that no one argued either way after Peter taught is telling.
Not really sophistry, semantics it is though. That is the order, the two of them brought the issue to Jerusalem. Then Peter speaks, then they agree, and then James acknowledges what Peter says. Pretty chronological there.
[quote]You cannot get around that the “sentence” James passed became policy. He said “my sentence”, not “Let’s do what Peter said.”
[/quote]
I don’t get it. They debate a lot, then Peter rose and said to them (everyone), “Blah blah blah.” He’s preaching for the first time salvation by faith in Christ alone. He does this first! No one has preached this among the Apostles before. There was no teaching on this before this point by anyone.
Look at the language, they were debating a lot, then Peter declares something…no more debating. Then everyone falls in line AFTER Peter speaks. Go on down to “we believe”…Peter speaks as the head and spokesman of the apostolic Church. He formulates a doctrinal judgment about the means of salvation, whereas James takes the floor after him to suggest a PASTORAL plan for inculturating the gospel in mixed communities where Jewish and Gentile believers live side by side. He doesn’t declare doctrinal anything, he says that as pastors they shouldn’t trouble them because of what “Peter has related”. He then tells them they should write to them to abstain from certain things.
There is basis for believing that others spoke after Peter. The language used in the verses are chronological.
[quote]Mr. Chen wrote:
You have cited Act 1:15 showing Peter standing up and making a speech, as he did in Acts 15. Did you note the final decision was not his alone unlike in Act 15 when James passed “sentence” on the matter, and his decision became policy?
And they appointed two, Joseph called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. (Act 1:23)
[/quote]
And no, only Matthias was chosen by lot, to replace Judas.
“And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
(Acts 1:26 ESV)”[/quote]
The post of yours I was answering cited these verses to show “Peter displaying his authority over the others.” I simply pointed out that the decision to cast lots was made by “them”, not Peter alone.
[/quote]
So? You seem to have a strange notion of what leadership looks like.
[quote]pat wrote:
What you are in essence claiming is that after the apostles Christianity was dead until Luther came around. That would also mean the bible cannon is not a Christian book since it was the Catholic Church who assembled it in 397 AD. [/quote]
I don’t follow your reasoning at all here. How am I claiming this?[/quote]
Well, if the biblical sourcing is incorrect, then history of the church is incorrect, which means history itself was incorrect and if an incorrect church, following incorrect procedures based on incorrect notions, then no cannon assemble by such a false entity would have any value at all much less be considered a holy or divinely inspired book.
So either the church is correct, is Christian, and is accurate in it’s history and tradition, or it’s not. If it’s not, than the bible it assembled has no meaning or value, because the institution that assembled it had no knowledge, authority or divine guidance to do so.
What you got there is a good ol’ fashion catch 22.
[quote]pat wrote:
What you are in essence claiming is that after the apostles Christianity was dead until Luther came around. That would also mean the bible cannon is not a Christian book since it was the Catholic Church who assembled it in 397 AD. [/quote]
I don’t follow your reasoning at all here. How am I claiming this?[/quote]
Well, if the biblical sourcing is incorrect, then history of the church is incorrect, which means history itself was incorrect and if an incorrect church, following incorrect procedures based on incorrect notions, then no cannon assemble by such a false entity would have any value at all much less be considered a holy or divinely inspired book.
So either the church is correct, is Christian, and is accurate in it’s history and tradition, or it’s not. If it’s not, than the bible it assembled has no meaning or value, because the institution that assembled it had no knowledge, authority or divine guidance to do so.
What you got there is a good ol’ fashion catch 22.[/quote]
Yes, I see now.
You equate “church” with Roman Catholic church. To you they are one and the same. This is not true at all. The RC church as it exists today, was not the same as the church of the 1st century. What you have in the RC today is the end result of centuries of incremental changes leading you farther and farther away from what the early christians were doing.
You think there was no bible before 397 AD. However (most of) the books of the NT were already being listed as a collection much earlier, as the Muratorian fragment attests to. Were these not the Scriptures given to us by “inspiration”? To say they weren’t until the RC church okayed them is absurd.
You seem to think there weren’t any Protestants until Luther. All throughout the Dark Ages, there were groups who protested against the doctrines of the RC. You will insist they were heretics. The printing of Tyndale’s English bible merely caused the pot to boil over Pat, but it had been heating up a long time. Luther was just more of the same in his neck of the woods. He is especially famous because he was a former monk who nailed his thesis right to the church door. A gutsy monk don’t you think? He was right on- “Why does the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the basilica of Saint Peter with the money of poor believers rather than with his own money?” He reminds me of Savonarola. There was already a whole English bible by John de Trevisa circulating by the mid 1300s. Wycliffe relied much on these early English versions. He was more famous because he was vehemently anti RC. Take a look at The Cambridge History of the Bible for details. The ingredients were already in the pot for Wycliffe to stir. It wasn’t just limited to Germany.
In fact, what you consider church history is actually anti-church history, as it involves the persecution and torture of those christians who preferred the Scriptures alone, and it’s pure teachings.
[quote]pat wrote:
What you are in essence claiming is that after the apostles Christianity was dead until Luther came around. That would also mean the bible cannon is not a Christian book since it was the Catholic Church who assembled it in 397 AD. [/quote]
I don’t follow your reasoning at all here. How am I claiming this?[/quote]
Well, if the biblical sourcing is incorrect, then history of the church is incorrect, which means history itself was incorrect and if an incorrect church, following incorrect procedures based on incorrect notions, then no cannon assemble by such a false entity would have any value at all much less be considered a holy or divinely inspired book.
So either the church is correct, is Christian, and is accurate in it’s history and tradition, or it’s not. If it’s not, than the bible it assembled has no meaning or value, because the institution that assembled it had no knowledge, authority or divine guidance to do so.
What you got there is a good ol’ fashion catch 22.[/quote]
Yes, I see now.
You equate “church” with Roman Catholic church. To you they are one and the same. This is not true at all. The RC church as it exists today, was not the same as the church of the 1st century. What you have in the RC today is the end result of centuries of incremental changes leading you farther and farther away from what the early christians were doing.
[/quote]
Let’s see we still celebrate the Eucharist, we still preach the good news, we still worship the Creator and his son and the Christ…I really don’t see the difference to much. What you don’t realize is all most every Catholic tenet is completely scriptural today as in yesterday. There was only one church. To say different is patently false. The Roman Catholic Church is the only one who can direclty trace it’s roots back to the apostles, hence apostolic tradition.
Second, the early Christians were no peaches either, they fornicated, power played, tried to introduce false doctrines, etc. I’d say we’ve improved. But to deny this is to necessarily change history.
There was no ‘sola scriptura’, there was no evangelical preaching, there was no ‘faith alone’ salvation. All that stuff is man made, derived as an interpretation of scripture. A scripture that was changed by a man, to fit what a man wanted it to be. What the early church was not, was evangelical. It’s a matter of history. It’s a matter of fact.
I said there was no bible cannon. No official assembly of scripture. Yes the books and epistles of the bible already existed, along with a lot of other books and epistles that were attempted to be passed off as holy scripture. It took the church to pick through and assemble the quintessential works of Divine origin. And without divine the divine authority of the church, the assemblage of the bible may or may not be correct. It could be completely wrong, unless it has the authority to declare it. Nobody else assembled the bible cannon. It was the Catholic Church. There were not the 36,000 divisions of Protestantism to make this declaration, there was no luther, there was no murderous calvin, there was the one Holy and Apostolic Church.
There were protesters, there were people who didn’t like the church. But what Luther experienced, was the corruption of the German bishop who was in fact corrupt. The practice of charging for indulgences was not every where and since the clergy typically don’t own anything of their own, or have much money to themselves, the pope technically is broke. Everything is borrowed. And there is and was periods of corruption in the church, but it was corrected. The practices were stopped. There was plenty of corruption in protestantism to, exemplified by Calvin who either had people killed or approved of their killing. Their crime? Going against his ‘religion’. A religion he made up.
It was tit for tat. Protestants would kill Catholics too in the good old days. You think you guys done no wrong ever?
Jesus was technically broke too. AND, he demonstrated His compassion for mankind’s plight by actually living that simple life. The pope is the exact opposite of Jesus. He presides over an organization that controls billions.
Excerpt:
“The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentieth century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.”
Jesus was technically broke too. AND, he demonstrated His compassion for mankind’s plight by actually living that simple life. The pope is the exact opposite of Jesus. He presides over an organization that controls billions.
Excerpt:
“The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentieth century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.”[/quote]
Sorry, my eyes fail me. Did you just quote a chick tract?
Jesus was technically broke too. AND, he demonstrated His compassion for mankind’s plight by actually living that simple life. The pope is the exact opposite of Jesus. He presides over an organization that controls billions.
Excerpt:
“The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentieth century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.”[/quote]
Sorry, my eyes fail me. Did you just quote a chick tract?[/quote]
No, it’s a quote from Avro Manhattan in the article. I suppose he’s a bad dude in your book. Of course, documentation refuting something in the article is welcome.
The excesses of Calvin were fairly local and brief if you compare them to the RC, which were widespread throughout Europe for 1000 years. Calvin I’m afraid can’t reach the big toe of the RC.
Don’t mean to berate you with her ugly history. Our topic of whether or not she is the church Christ founded and intended to carry His name, makes it very relevant.
[quote]Mr. Chen wrote:
Sorry Pat, but I have to pull this one out too:
The excesses of Calvin were fairly local and brief if you compare them to the RC, which were widespread throughout Europe for 1000 years. Calvin I’m afraid can’t reach the big toe of the RC.
Don’t mean to berate you with her ugly history. Our topic of whether or not she is the church Christ founded and intended to carry His name, makes it very relevant.[/quote]
I know the history hoss, your not laying any news on me. There have been good times and bad.
And if you look closely at it, it’s often people who were a part of, or associated with the church and not things sanctioned by the Holy See.
But keep in mind, if you devalue the church, you devalue the scriptures, it really is that simple. And whether you like it or not, we are the only church who can trace our history back to Matthew 16:18. Nobody else can make that claim. You may not like it, you may hate it, but that’s the plain fact warts and all. No amount of history rewrites, or tortured logic is going to change that fact.
[quote]Mr. Chen wrote:
Sorry Pat, but I have to pull this one out too:
The excesses of Calvin were fairly local and brief if you compare them to the RC, which were widespread throughout Europe for 1000 years. Calvin I’m afraid can’t reach the big toe of the RC.
Don’t mean to berate you with her ugly history. Our topic of whether or not she is the church Christ founded and intended to carry His name, makes it very relevant.[/quote]
Berate is exactly what you are trying to do, because if you can make it look bad, than you feel better. It’s a cheap facade rooted in hate, but you feel better at least for the moment.
Jesus was technically broke too. AND, he demonstrated His compassion for mankind’s plight by actually living that simple life. The pope is the exact opposite of Jesus. He presides over an organization that controls billions.
Excerpt:
“The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentieth century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.”[/quote]
Well your quoting from a website that clearly has a bone to pick. And yes the church has enormous wealth. It’s also the largest charity organization in the world.
It seems you spend an awful lot of time feeding your hatred. Is this how you are proposing to get closer to God? Your going to rewrite history, edit scripture to suit your needs, to feed a burning hatred for God’s people, rooted in falsehood and lies and that’s going to help your relationship with God how?
The church has been around for 2000 years, do you really think your going to destroy it? If Nero couldn’t do it, you damn sure won’t be able to.
Oh for sure, the protestants were also putting people on the rack and torturing them for days, then burning them alive.[/quote]
You must be a very angry person… Who are you referring to?
And yes, you guys have some serious whack-a-doodles… Heard of Westboro? You agree with them? They are protestants, that means they all must be bad right?
Jesus was technically broke too. AND, he demonstrated His compassion for mankind’s plight by actually living that simple life. The pope is the exact opposite of Jesus. He presides over an organization that controls billions.
Excerpt:
“The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentieth century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.”[/quote]
Sorry, my eyes fail me. Did you just quote a chick tract?[/quote]
No, it’s a quote from Avro Manhattan in the article. I suppose he’s a bad dude in your book. Of course, documentation refuting something in the article is welcome.
[/quote]
Sorry, Chick publications that also prints Chick tracts. I don’t trust a man that spreads his message by hate and lies.
[quote]Mr. Chen wrote:
Sorry Pat, but I have to pull this one out too:
The excesses of Calvin were fairly local and brief if you compare them to the RC, which were widespread throughout Europe for 1000 years. Calvin I’m afraid can’t reach the big toe of the RC.
Don’t mean to berate you with her ugly history. Our topic of whether or not she is the church Christ founded and intended to carry His name, makes it very relevant.[/quote]
I know the history hoss, your not laying any news on me. There have been good times and bad.
And if you look closely at it, it’s often people who were a part of, or associated with the church and not things sanctioned by the Holy See.
But keep in mind, if you devalue the church, you devalue the scriptures, it really is that simple. And whether you like it or not, we are the only church who can trace our history back to Matthew 16:18. Nobody else can make that claim. You may not like it, you may hate it, but that’s the plain fact warts and all. No amount of history rewrites, or tortured logic is going to change that fact.[/quote]
I find it interesting that the CC’s greatest pride (tracing history back to Matthew) is the flip side of their greatest negative (long history of cruelty, corruption, bigotry, etc). And all religions have had really bad eras including Protestants, Jews, Muslims, etc. I’m not picking on the CC. It seems to be a bigger problem with organized religion in general. Maybe that’s why a lot of people, myself included, don’t feel comfortable associating themselves with any organized religion. Because some part of nearly all of them really really suck. Anyway, I’ll cut the rant short.
What I really want to share is a local news article about a study of why lots of Catholics aren’t going to Mass…(it’s more interesting than my lame intro):
[quote]Sweet Revenge wrote:
What I really want to share is a local news article about a study of why lots of Catholics aren’t going to Mass…(it’s more interesting than my lame intro):
[quote]pat wrote:
What you are in essence claiming is that after the apostles Christianity was dead until Luther came around. That would also mean the bible cannon is not a Christian book since it was the Catholic Church who assembled it in 397 AD. [/quote]
I don’t follow your reasoning at all here. How am I claiming this?[/quote]
Well, if the biblical sourcing is incorrect, then history of the church is incorrect, which means history itself was incorrect and if an incorrect church, following incorrect procedures based on incorrect notions, then no cannon assemble by such a false entity would have any value at all much less be considered a holy or divinely inspired book.
So either the church is correct, is Christian, and is accurate in it’s history and tradition, or it’s not. If it’s not, than the bible it assembled has no meaning or value, because the institution that assembled it had no knowledge, authority or divine guidance to do so.
What you got there is a good ol’ fashion catch 22.[/quote]
Yes, I see now.
You equate “church” with Roman Catholic church. To you they are one and the same. This is not true at all. The RC church as it exists today, was not the same as the church of the 1st century. What you have in the RC today is the end result of centuries of incremental changes leading you farther and farther away from what the early christians were doing.
You think there was no bible before 397 AD. However (most of) the books of the NT were already being listed as a collection much earlier, as the Muratorian fragment attests to. Were these not the Scriptures given to us by “inspiration”? To say they weren’t until the RC church okayed them is absurd.
You seem to think there weren’t any Protestants until Luther. All throughout the Dark Ages, there were groups who protested against the doctrines of the RC. You will insist they were heretics. The printing of Tyndale’s English bible merely caused the pot to boil over Pat, but it had been heating up a long time. Luther was just more of the same in his neck of the woods. He is especially famous because he was a former monk who nailed his thesis right to the church door. A gutsy monk don’t you think? He was right on- “Why does the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the basilica of Saint Peter with the money of poor believers rather than with his own money?” He reminds me of Savonarola. There was already a whole English bible by John de Trevisa circulating by the mid 1300s. Wycliffe relied much on these early English versions. He was more famous because he was vehemently anti RC. Take a look at The Cambridge History of the Bible for details. The ingredients were already in the pot for Wycliffe to stir. It wasn’t just limited to Germany.
In fact, what you consider church history is actually anti-church history, as it involves the persecution and torture of those christians who preferred the Scriptures alone, and it’s pure teachings.
[/quote]
There is a difference between saying that certain texts were considered authoritative Scripture and certain texts were included in the canon. A book can be considered authoritative without being a part of a closed collection of authoritative literature to which nothing can be added or subtracted (a canon). Everything that was included in the canon was considered scriptural by the church; not everything that was considered scriptural by the church made it into the canon. There were numerous texts that the early church fathers quoted as Scripture that were later not included in the canon (1 Enoch, for example). Consequently, it is true that the Bible, i.e., the closed collection of authoritative documents, did not exist as such until relatively late.