[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]KingKai25 wrote:
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
[quote]KingKai25 wrote:<<< I think Tirib hit the nail pretty cleanly here. There are only three points I would make… 1) The books were considered inspired by the majority of the early church fathers. >>>[/quote]Ok, but didn’t they fail to recognize them formally for a thousand years? Its’ been about that long since I actually read anything of substance on this. [quote]KingKai25 wrote:<<< 3) The books do NOT support the Catholic doctrines they are supposedly used for. Honestly, reading these texts in their historical context clearly reveals that they have NOTHING to do with catholic doctrines. I’ll give an example a little later.[/quote]The only thing I remembered was something about indulgences. This came up a couple years ago and I told Dmaddox (where ya been man), that the essential gospel wouldn’t change even if we included the apocryphal books. That’s the way I remembered that too.
[/quote]
No I think you’re right - Trent settled a lot of things for the Roman Catholics. But Trent functioned much like the canonization process - it made what had already been recognized definitive. In other words, it codified existing practice. The texts were already widely recognized as authoritative before Trent (not that it mattered much when 99% of parishioners couldn’t read anyway).
And I wasn’t critiquing your point about indulgences. You’re dead on there. Roman Catholics argue that 2 Maccabees 12 supports the notion of indulgences. My point is that, when read in their proper historical context, the texts do NOT actually support the Catholic doctrines.
Take 2 Maccabees 12 and compare its worldview to the Roman Catholic.
(1) In 2 Maccabees 12:43, it does not say that Judas payed thousands of drachmas AS a sacrifice. Rather, he paid FOR a sacrifice, the traditional way of assuaging the people’s sinfulness. In other words, Judas relies on the existing sacrificial system to gain pardon for people. NOW, was the ancient Jewish sacrificial system based on the concept for stored merit (i.e., the sacrifice works because someone else’s good deeds are applied to me through the sacrifice)? NO, not at all. The sacrificial system works because of gracious condescension to human realities - the divine wrath is assuaged by the sacrifice. The sacrifice does NOT function as a means of trading merit, but merely a means of switching victims of wrath. Fact - Second Temple Judaism exhibited NO concept of indulgences (stored merit). If Second Temple Judaism thought in terms of SACRIFICE (one victim taking the place of another) rather than INDULGENCE (one’s good deeds applied to another), then on what grounds can the Church rightly argue that indulgences are hinted at in this passage?
(2) 2 Macc. 12:43-45 details Judas’ reasons for providing a sacrifice, and here we get a glimpse at the Jewish view of the afterlife, a view which stands at odds with the Catholic view. THe narrator argues in 2 Mac. 12:43-45 that what Judas did in providing for a sacrifice is a righteous deed premised on the assumption that the dead will rise again. Here is the key part - “in doing this (giving money) he acted very well and honorably, taking account of the resurrection; FOR IF HE HAD NO BEEN EXPECTING THAT THOSE WHO HAD FALLEN (in battle) WOULD RISE AGAIN, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SUPERFLUOUS AND FOOLISH TO PRAY FOR THE DEAD.” Notice that the argument revolves around RESURRECTION, NOT THE DISEMBODIED STATE. For the Second Temple Jews, the righteous didn’t go to heaven or hell (and certainly not purgatory) upon death; rather, they were truly DEAD, awaiting the resurrection of their bodies. Judas’ sacrifice is meant, not to ease their suffering in the disembodied state, but to secure their good future AT THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD.
In other words, the view of the afterlife represented in 2 Macc. is ENTIRELY different than that of the Roman Catholics. For the author of 2 Macc., sacrifice is performed to cleanse the guilt of the entire people (including the fallen - think of Joshua 7 and the story of Achan) so that, at the resurrection, all will evade eternal punishment (FINAL PUNISHMENT); indulgences are rooted in the Catholic belief in the church’s accumulated merit (not sacrifice) alleviating the justified suffering (TEMPORAL PUNISHMENT) of those in the disembodied state.[/quote]
It’s not entirely different. The idea of forgiveness of sins and post-mortem relinquishing of temporal punishment is sufficient for our needs. No claim was made that 2 Macc is slam-dunk scripture with regards to purgatory or indulgences, just a part of the fabric.[/quote]
I understand what you are saying, Pat. You could say that, VERY broadly speaking, they are analogous - both discuss forgiveness of sins as it relates to one’s end time position.
However, you need more than a broadly analogous situation to demonstrate that the Scriptures actually provide evidence for a church practice. On all the particulars, they are different - 2 Maccabees presupposes an entirely different understanding of judgment, post-mortem existence, and the afterlife than Catholics hold.
If you will, would you explain to me the line of argumentation that would lead one to derive the notion of indulgences from 2 Maccabees?