Posted on 08/29/2018 6:06:28 AM PDT by markomalley
Someone is a really really poor observer of Human Nature.
2 Thessalonians 2:15 - So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.
2 Thessalonians 3:6 - Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is living in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us.
How do we reconcile this? Is God a liar? Is he two faced?
I welcome your thoughts.
Christ is right to rebuke the Scribes for their blind adherence to their traditions, while their very lives ignore the prescribed practices in their daily lives.
We must pay attention to the behavior Christ is criticizing and not get hung up on the word "tradition" as though that were the problem.
Specifically:
Gospel Mt 23:23-26
Jesus said: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You pay tithes of mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier things of the law: judgment and mercy and fidelity. But these you should have done, without neglecting the others. Blind guides, who strain out the gnat and swallow the camel!
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You cleanse the outside of cup and dish, but inside they are full of plunder and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, cleanse first the inside of the cup, so that the outside also may be clean."
Catholics wrote, compiled, canonized, and protected the NT via tradition and the magisterium.
This is the problem with tradition, they can change over time. I am not anti tradition just to clarify my position.
Joh 6:31 After all, our ancestors ate manna while they journeyed through the wilderness! The Scriptures say, ‘Moses gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”
Joh 6:32 Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, Moses didn’t give you bread from heaven. My Father did. And now He offers you the true bread from heaven.
Note the above, tradition says Moses gave the manna. They even think they are quoting scripture. What does Jesus say?
Christ is right to rebuke the Scribes for their blind adherence to their traditions, while their very lives ignore the prescribed practices in their daily lives.
What was the test for their tradition? What authority did Jesus use?
Catholics did "receive" it, and then they taught it across the world, and later wrote it down under the guidance of the Holy Spirit as promised by Christ.
It is important to study Church History to understand how early these traditions were laid down and when it was captured in writing and established as part of the canon of faith.
Regarding your citations from John 6:
Christ is not criticizing the tradition regarding eating the manna. He is correcting their perception that it was from Moses.
As we read on in John 6, we see that the manna was a prefiguration of the Eucharist.
33 For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world.”
34 They said to him, “Lord, give us this bread always.”
35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.
And later:
48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died.
50 This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that a man may eat of it and not die.
51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
Uh...No, they were NOT!
No, Christ is condemning the concept of going through the motions and not living the faith, as noted in this part of Mt 23:
"You pay tithes of mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier things of the law: judgment and mercy and fidelity. But these you should have done, without neglecting the others."
1 Corinthians 11:2 - I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you.2 Thessalonians 2:15 - So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.
2 Thessalonians 3:6 - Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is living in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us.
Maybe I'm saying something that's already quite clear to you, but here Paul uses three phrases which specify "What tradition?"
Paul is saying that there are traditions from him and/or from him and the other apostles ("us")
And he specifically says these traditions (Apostolic Traditions) have the same authority, whether they are "by word of mouth" or "by letter."
So he's not talking about "any old tradition." He's talking about specific things said or written from himself and the other Apostles. That's why they're called "Apostolic," and why, to distinguish them from other traditions, these particular ones are often spelled with a capital-T in languages which use upper-case and lower-case letters.
(Note that neither the Hebrew nor the Greek in the Apostolic Age had both upper-case and lower-case letters, but we do in English and some other languages.)
Since we're commanded to "receive, stand firm and hold to, and maintain" these traditions, how do you do that with respect to the traditions which were (at that time) oral?
The oral teaching of all the Apostles was spreading rapidly through the Levant, the eastern Mediterranean, Egypt/Ethiopia, the province of Asia (Anatolia) and western Asia generally, --- spreading more rapidly than the written Tradition (NT Scripture). It's this oral tradition and example (plus the OT) which was the very basis for the establishment of local congregations. They were ALWAYS founded on the basis of Oral Apostolic Tradition; only later (a few years, a generation later) was that supplemented with the whole written canon of the NT. Obviously. Local churches were being planted through those regions even before the last book of the NT was written ---
What you'd have to do is look and see what doctrines, practices, prayers/hymns, observances, ways of life, all those communities had in common.
That some doctrines and practices were common to all believers, on three continents, shows that these far-flung congregations had not devised themselves as a DIY religion, but had gotten ways f worship and ways of life from their Apostolic teachers. The new local churches heeded their preaching, passed on their teaching, imitated them and followed their example.
Excuse my dilation on this topic. It may all be obvious to already, but I wanted to throw in my two cents here.
Little-t tradition. can change. Big-T Apostolic Tradition is a "deposit": other than "spelling out" its own innate implications, it essentially remains the same.
For instance, compare the Apostles' Creed to the slightly later ones. The later ones explain and disambiguate the meaning of the very earliest Creed.
Jude 1:3
Beloved, although I made every effort to write you about the salvation we share, I felt it necessary to write and urge you to contend earnestly for the faith entrusted once for all to the saints.
He says he made every effort to write; he says it's also necessary to "contend earnestly" for the faith "entrusted" to them. Evidently it was not all entrusted by writing; it was also entrusted by word of mouth and by imitation/example.
St. John says repeatedly, that there was a LOT more that wasn't written down at that point, toward the end of his Gospel and his Epistles. And he was one of the last to put a portion of his teachings into writing.
Do you ever think about that? What was that 'lot more'? You're not supposed to be indifferent to it, or think it's not knowable. You've got to contend for it.
As I continually say, I don’t worship a priest, I don’t worship the pope, I worship, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I will stick with church Christ established.
This is a hard one. I have never given to any of the charities because of my own research but the offerings in the parish go to keep the lights on, so to speak. Some of that will go to the diocese in the form of Cathedraticum but w/o weekly offerings the churches would have to close their doors.
We tossed this around years ago with having parishioners who we know give regularly, actually pay a bill rather than make an offering so that would bypass the diocese.
Our parish already runs short of money and we have to fund raise constantly. W/o fund raising, we run about 30K short of meeting our obligations. We live in one of the poorest counties in the nation.
Off subject and because it is a caucus thread : Do you know anyone who can interpret this statute for me?
2006 New Mexico Statutes - Section 37-1-30 — Action for damages due to childhood sexual abuse; limitation on actions.
37-1-30. Action for damages due to childhood sexual abuse; limitation on actions.
(2) three years from the date of the time that a person knew or had reason to know of the childhood sexual abuse and that the childhood sexual abuse resulted in an injury to the person, as established by competent medical or psychological testimony.
I’m asking this: Does it refer to a person with knowledge who didn’t intervene or is it referring to the victim and their recalling of the abuse, as in recovering the memory?
Living in a bubble or echo chamber is a dangerous thing, and what led to the activities underlying this scandal to begin with.
St. John says repeatedly, that there was a LOT more that wasn’t written down at that point, toward the end of his Gospel and his Epistles.
Now if a tradition told us to forget one of Gods ten commandments, would that be a bad tradition? I really would like an answer to this.
We are also warned in Revelations:
Rev 22:18 And I solemnly declare to everyone who hears the words of prophecy written in this book: If anyone adds anything to what is written here, God will add to that person the plagues described in this book.
Rev 22:19 And if anyone removes any of the words from this book of prophecy, God will remove that person’s share in the tree of life and in the holy city that are described in this book.
Now some might think that is only a reference to the book of Revelations. But if one reads the whole bible in context it applies to the whole Bible. God continually warns through the whole Bible about adding and detracting from His written word.
You can't repeal the principle of non-contradiction A does not equal non-A --- not at the same time or in the same way --- any more than you can repeal the Law of Gravity. (It's the Third Law of Logic) It is built into the structure of reality.
The key to Apostolic Tradition is the Canon of Vincent of Lerins, namely it is something believed by the Church always, by everybody, everywhere.
Naturally that is a simplified way of saying, in the context of the times, it's something that the most ancient local churches on three continents (Europe, Asia, Africa)--- or the Patriarchal Sees of Jerusalem, Antioch, Constantinople, Alexandria and Rome --- all had as part of their belief and prayer practice and way of life, without any unresolveable conflicts.
IOW, if there was a very early and very general consensus across Christendom, and was learned, as they preach and teach, from the Apostles, then it's big-T Tradition or Apostolic Tradition (as contrasted to merely human tradition, say folk tradition or your grandma's family tradition.)
It is this Sacred Tradition which yielded, as one of its first fruits, the canon of Scripture.
Since Apostolic Tradition --- like the Apostles Creed and the Didache --- predated the formalization of the Canon by hundreds of years, if you hit delete on Apostolic Tradition,the canon of Scripture disappears from your screen.
Irenaeus of Lyons was a third-generation Catholic, the disciple of Polycarp of Smyrna, who was the disciple of St. John the Evangelist. He maintained strongly that 'rule of faith' (regula fidei) is preserved by a church through the continuity of its teaching, with the Apostles.
Athanasius, one of the "heroes" of the Council of Nicaea, was convinced that Arianism fell into its erroneous belief that Jesus is not fully and co-eternally God, equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit, because it did not adhere to the interpretation of Scripture which they had learned from the Apostles: Sacred Tradition.
The reason why we hold an orthodox understanding of the Incarnation and the Trinity --- we are neither Unitarians nor Polytheists --- is because of Tradition, which buttresses the right interpretation of Scripture.
Please do not encourage other people to sin, it does not reflect at all well upon you that you desire them to abandon Our Lord.
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