Posted on 07/08/2006 6:41:47 AM PDT by DouglasKC
FYI...
Well, the text certainly does suggest that the Church became wholly heretic by the time of Ignatius. This is very convenient as, if it were true, that would completely impeach the triple ministry of Bishops, presbyters and deacons and call the continuing Church Apostolicity into serious question.
But let us know who wrote this:
The organization sponsoring the site is the United Church of God. This group appears not to understand the concept of ousia/hypostasis, nor of the natures of Christ (they appear to have a subtle Arian attitude toward Him, implying eternal co-existence but never quite the unity proclaimed by the Church), nor of the Personhood of the Holy Spirit (who comes across as an powerful emanation, rather than a co-equal Person). Nor do they appear to recognize the validity or purpose of any Sacrament except that of Baptism, which they understand in a spiritual rather than complete (i.e., spiritual and bodily) sense. For instance, the Eucharist, directly commanded by our Lord and clearly explained and expounded by Paul (see I Cor 11:17 et seq.), is never even mentioned. Nor is the text John 6:41-51, where our Lord's words about being the bread of life and the key statement, "If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh" is also never stated.
On the other hand, they do insist upon ritual cleanliness in foods, observe Easter as Quartodecemians and hold their Sabbath on Saturday. In the former case, Matt 15:3-9 should have sufficed to erase the Levitical prohibitions on ritual cleanliness. As to 14 Abib, nowhere in the Catholic Church is this dating still used. It is true that the West and East do not agree on which date to set Easter, but both agree on the process, and neither use the Hebrew calendar. Maintaining Saturday as the Sabbath implicitly sets the ancient Hebrew celebration of the Creation ahead of the Resurrection of Christ. The Universal Church has decided otherwise.
I might also point out that they never do quite connect the local heresies in Galatia and Corinth with what eventually developed as the Eucharist and the Apostolic Ministry, yet they do assert that the whole Church languished in disorderly heresy until set right by Constantine.
This rather begs a great number of questions, not the least of which is where Constantine received his Apostolic mandate to regularize and institutionalize the Church. There happens to be a great literature on the subject, but none of that is cited here.
So while there is useful Scriptural citation here (and some felicitious translation), this whole article is a perfect example of exactly what Paul, Peter and John were prophesying against.
I thank you for bringing this to attention and am glad I read it. I do wish the authors were of the true Apostolic succession and joyful members of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. On the evidence of this and other articles at their website, I cannot come to that conclusion but rather that they have taken on Montanist, Seventh-Day-Adventist and even Lollard attitudes, perhaps out of fear and anxiety about the perilous times in which we live. But then again, all times are perilous until our Lord returns in glory. We are to hold up our eyes and look to the heavens whence comes our salvation and believe on Him, letting all eartly concerns be set aside as transient and of no account.
Well said!
Very helpful edification. Thanks!
This document is very light on quotations from Christian writers of the period 100 AD to 300 AD. In fact, there is no documentation about any of his claims about the Church in that period. Actually, he has the history completely backwards. He refers to Scriptural passages about false religions and new doctrines creeping into the Church and then tries to identify those with early Catholicism. That is a completely inverted understanding of the development of the early Church. Most scholars, of whatever religious affiliation, would tell you that the kinds of false doctrines that are alluded to in the New Testament were forms of "gnosticism" and "docetism". The gnostic sects were amalgamations of Christianity (or Judaism) with eastern mystery cults. They had all sorts of wierd beliefs (which one can read about in many places) that had no counterpart in any modern form of Christianity, Catholic or Protestant.
The docetist sects (which overlapped the gnostics) taught that Jesus did not have a real physical body and was not really crucified. These heresies and sects persisted for quite a while, and they were bitterly fought against by the early bishops of the Church, like St. Ignatius of Antioch (died as a martyr 107 AD) and St. Irenaeus of Lyon (late 2nd century). Ignatius comndemns these sects in his famous letters to the Churches of Asia and Irenaeus wrote a long book attacking these heresies. By the way, St. Ignatius was a disciple of the Apostle John himself, and St. Irenaeus was a pupil of St. Polycarp, who was himself a disciple of the Apostle John.
The bishops of the Catholic Church, in other words, were champions of apostolic doctrine against the very heresies that the New Testament condemns. There was indeed a growth of Church structures and Church authority in the first few centuries, but it was precisely as a defense mechanism against the very heresies that the New Testament condemns. Many of the gnostic and other heretics were going around preaching their own alternative gospels. In reaction to this, the orthodox Christians emphasized that their own doctrines (a) came in an unbroken line of teachers from the Apostles themselves (as we see was the case with Ignatius and Irenaeus) --- this is the idea of "apostolic succession" and (b) that the real orthodox churches throughout the world
were all preaching the same doctrines in a consistent way, where as the heretics were all disagreeing with each other and teaching many different alternative gospels. The idea here was the since the real churches all got their doctrine from the same source, they all were consistent with each other, whereas the heresies were all newly sprouted weeds and therefore did not even agree with each other. This is why the early Christians began to emphasize that the true doctrines were the ones taught by "the catholic (=universal) Church" throughout the world. The first recorded use of the term "Catholic Church" was in the letters of St. Ignatius (Ad 107). One finds it used several times in "The Martyrdom of St. Polycarp" (written 155 AD). So the emphasis on "apostolic tradition" and "apostolic succession" and the catholicity of the Church, were all ways the early Church defended herself against the very heresies that St. Paul condemned.
Also the authority of bishops and the compiling of approved (or "canonical") books of Scripture were ways that the Church defended against these same early heresies. All this happened LONG before the Roman emperors had anything to do with the Church. The Roman emperors did not try to interfere in the Church's affairs until the fourth century. All one has to do is read the "ante-Nicene fathers", i.e. the ones who wrote before 300 AD, and one sees that all the distinctively Catholic doctrines are there : the authority of bishops, the visible unity of the "Catholic Church" as a divinely established institution, the real presence of Christ's body and blood in the Eucharist, the Eucharist as the central act of worship of Christians, the Eucharist as a "sacrifice", the one foretold by the prophet Malachi that would be offered in every place from the rising of the sun to its setting by the gentiles, the special place of the bishop of Rome (=pope) among the bishops, and so on.
This document that someone posted is just wishful thinking and speculation with no documentation (because none is possible) from actual early Christian writings. My advice: read the early Church fathers, and you will see that they were biblical Christians defending biblical truths.
Thanks for your response. There are a number of mistatements here, but I'm going to confine the discussion as to how they pertain to the point of the article.
You mention the Eucharist. One of the ways in which traditional Christianity has strayed from the truth is in WHEN the bread and wine are supposed to be eaten and drank in remembrance of Christ. In remembrance:
1Co 11:24 And when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.
1Co 11:25 After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.
The partaking (and I'm sure you'll agree), is done in remembrance of Christ and his sacrifice. It's memorial to his death.
What has been lost is that this was done on Passover, a festival instituted by God:
Lev 23:5 In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the LORD's passover.
Passover, the Lord's passover, is a yearly event. Memorials are held on a yearly basis. Christ changed the way Passover is celebrated by illuminating it's true meaning. He did NOT change the fact that Passover, and all of the Lord's festivals, still exists.
Traditional Christianity has removed those festivals and instituted their own. This is just one way that it has deviaed from the bible.
1Co 5:7 Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
On the other hand, they do insist upon ritual cleanliness in foods, observe Easter as Quartodecemians and hold their Sabbath on Saturday.
A couple of points that are mistaken on this. I do not, and nor does UCG, insist upon "ritual cleanliness" of foods. Again, this is another area in which traditional Christianity as deviated from God's word. God created certain animals as food for humans, and many animals as not acceptable for food. These are clearly listed in Levitucus:
Lev 11:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, These are the beasts which ye shall eat among all the beasts that are on the earth.
God tells his children what animals to eat and what not to eat.
It's possible that you're confusing the ritual eating habits of the Jewish religion with what's in the bible. Christ agreed that this ritual is a manmade custom:
Mat 15:2 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread. Mat 15:3 But he answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?
You quoted Matthew 15, but the verses quoted show that Christ was addressing traditions of the Jewish "church", not what was written in scripture. The traditional Christian church is in the same circumstance today, elevating tradition over scripture.
Concerning the sabbath, guilty. The Lord's sabbath is on the 7th day, from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset:
Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Exo 20:9 Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work:
Exo 20:10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
Exo 20:11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
The Lord blessed the sabbath and day and made it holy. Good enough for me.
This rather begs a great number of questions, not the least of which is where Constantine received his Apostolic mandate to regularize and institutionalize the Church. There happens to be a great literature on the subject, but none of that is cited here.
With good reason. The authority of scripture is superior to any opinions or treatises that man has written concerning it. That's why the article focuses on scripture rather than historical opinions of men.
thank you for bringing this to attention and am glad I read it. I do wish the authors were of the true Apostolic succession and joyful members of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
I thank you for your respectful tone. Obviously I don't share your belief that the Catholic church IS the church established by Christ, although I'm sure there are members, or at least future members of God's church within that organization.
Sorry, I should have pinged you to post 8.
But . . . who established the canon of scripture?
God. Canonical scripture was well established before it was formalized as part of traditional Christianity.
That's a major historical error. There were a lot of sacred writings floating about until the Church (inspired of course by the Holy Spirit) decided what was in and what was out.
I have studied saints and miracles. I feel sad when I encounter someone like this, because I think their religion does not have history or the strenght of being part of the mystical body of Christ. Becausre their focus is always exclusively on the first century, they do not see what majesty the Holy Spirit has accomplished through his church. They are suceptible to da Vinci code type challenges because they do not see the living God renewing his work in every century including ours.
Wow...
This will take some study and contemplation --
Glad you brought the article to FR
You make it sound like the men knew better than God what was to be canonized. :-) The canonization happened long before any man was involved. Putting a stamp of approval on something doesn't mean you were it's author.
I'm glad you found it interesting and hope you find your study gratifying.
lol.
This article is crap. Can anyone here actually provide any evidence, any evidence at all, and by that I mean actual documented cause and effect, that shows pagans entering the Church (which would mean they became Christians!) changed a single Church teaching?
I have heard this claim before, and not surprisingly it always seems to come from Protestants (wishful thinking) or rationalists (hoping against hope) just as with the two "scholars" mentioned in this article. But where's thr proof? Why isn't there a single document anywhere in the world which says something along the lines of, "Ever since we started letting those pagans, gee, they've changed the Church's teachings"?
Nice post. But what I was really looking to see was examples of how modern day churches are turning from the truth of the gospel. Such as ordaining homosexuals, accepting homosexuality, redefining marriage, etc. Any articles on that? Thanks
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