Posted on 07/16/2009 12:27:42 AM PDT by GonzoII
What you're describing is a "sufficient" condition, in the sense that the set of items is sufficient to provide transportation by means of a gasoline-powered car.
But of course, gasoline, etc. are not necessary to your end goal, which is transportation. You could also use a bicycle or a horse for the same end; and in those cases gasoline is clearly not a "necessary" component of transportation. In fact, feeding gasoline to your horse may well thwart your attempt to meet the end objective of "transportation".
Dragging it back to the topic at hand, I think it's actually pretty important to understand the implications of those two terms, especially as it relates to trying to understand and work with people whose religious views differ from your own -- even and perhaps especially among sincere Christians. We can see where these differing views feed the ugly (and often silly) controversies that divide us along doctrinal lines.
How one views the question of "Bible Only" depends in large part on how we apply the ideas of "necessary" and "sufficient" to the desired end result of knowing God's word.
A person might say that the Bible is a sufficient, but not a necessary way of knowing God's word. This viewpoint says that the Bible is a complete record of God's word, but not necessarily the only way to obtain that complete record. There are some pretty big implications to this view, examples of which I trust you can supply for yourself. I don't think either of us subscribes to this point of view....
Or, one might say that the Bible is a necessary but not sufficient source of God's word -- it tells us some, but not all of what God wants us to know. I suppose we could explicitly assign that viewpoint to the Mormons; but it's also applicable to those who believe that the Holy Spirit teaches and guides us ... that is, you and me.
Or we could say that the Bible is both necessary and sufficient, which means that something is God's Word if and only if it is found in the Bible.... the main problem there being that it would be impossible to apply the Bible to our everyday lives, as to do so would require interpretation, meaning that the Bible is not sufficient after all.
I see salvation to the glory of God being the purpose of the Bible (these are written so you may have life), so when I say it contains all that’s necessary, then I mean that in terms of salvation.
This is precisely where the difference between "necessary" and "sufficient" becomes important, especially in what you say here.
Although I know it's not what you meant, taken literally what you said would mean that salvation is guaranteed as soon as we can lay our hands on a Bible; it doesn't depend on the God Whose words it expresses. Jesus put that one to bed in John 5:39... In any case, we no doubt agree that just having a Bible isn't the point; we need to "read, mark, and inwardly digest" it as well. And more than that, we almost certainly agree that it is God Who accomplishes our salvation; we can't achieve eternal life on our own, no matter what we do with our Bibles.
It doesn’t give me step-by-step instructions on how to conduct a church homecoming program. That, however, is not necessary for salvation.
And here we get into sticky territory. Certainly the Bible instructs us about the nature of our salvation; but I think it's going too far to suggest that what's in the Bible actually confers salvation.
And, the reason it must be the bible is because the bible ONLY has the word of God.
But then, what about the Holy Spirit? Doesn't the Holy Spirit instruct and guide us, and is not that also the word of God?
Another distinction that needs to be made is between Bible as text vs. Bible as deposit of faith.
By Bible as text I don't want to get as specific as various codices and translations. For our purposes here it would suffice to grant that all translations, good and bad, deliver essentially the same text. Nor would I want to go into the question of canon and especially the Deuterocanon. We can have these disputes some other day. Let us therefore assume that the Bible as Text is, certainly, authority of its own, at least like some other imporant documents such as the American Constitution are, and in fact more, since our very eternal life is connected to it. I will later refer to the Scripture in that specific sense.
But that is still different from the Deposit of Faith that the Bible represents. By Deposit of Faith I mean not the book itself but the knowledge represented by the book. We know that the Apostles and therefore the Early Church had that knowledge infallibly if not each apostle in full individually then in college. Again, I'd rather not be distracted in this subtopic by whether the Early Church was Catholic as Catholics understand it to be, or something else. Let us simply agree that the Early Church possessed the knowledge even before the text was written. We should therefore make the distinction between that knowledge and the complete text of the Bible.That knowledge is Bible as Deposit of Faith. St. Jude speaks of it:
...concerning your common salvation, I was under a necessity to write unto you: to beseech you to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. (Jd 1:3)
I have a feeling that a lot of what our Protestant (I use the term loosely and include all Christians that positively assess the Reformation's chief principles) critics say regarding the Scripture would be wholly unobjectionable to an Orthodox or a Catholic, if it instead applied to the Bible as Deposit of Faith. We agree that the Deposit of Faith is the cardinal Rule of Faith; the other rules that we as Catholics might obey are derivatives.
Why are the two not the same?
Clearly, the Deposit of Faith cannot contradict the Scripture, but we cannot be sure if it isomorphically matches the Scripture. If it is not yet clear from the last item enumerating the difference between the two, consider that the Scripture by universal admission contains passages that allow for different logical interpretation. Such are, for examples, the parables and conversational teaching of Christ. The parables, the Scripture tells us, were the preferred method Jesus taught the people, while the Apostles received the doctrinal teaching. But the Scripture leaves many parables uninterpreted. The directly recorded words of Christ are often cryptic. Did Christ mean to teach us, as He asked the rich young man to give everything to the poor and follow Him, that (1) rich men don't go to heaven? or (2) monastic life is the ideal form of Christian discipleship? or (3) we have to serve Christ with our whole being no matter what our economic condition is? or (4) we cannot earn salvation by charitable work?
Important doctrines nearly all Christians agree upon are a product of interpretive work. The Holy Trinity and divinity of Christ are examples. Veneration of saints or the consecrated faculty of priests, or the papacy are specifically Catholic and Orthodox interpretations of certain scriptural passages that are not accepted as valid by the Protestants. The interpretation that any work, even sincere work of charity does not contribute to salvation is a specifically Protestant interpretation that is at least claimed to be derived from Scripture, and is rejected by the non-Protestants. The exact nature of the Eucharist also has room for interpretation or refusal to interpret (as both Luther and your Orthodox priest would attest), although it is very difficult for me to see how the desacralized view on it fits the Scripture.
One can adopt the Catholic view on the Scripture and still not be Catholic. The Catholic view is simple: the Scripture is one, a very important one, evidence of the nature of the Deposit of Faith "once delivered to the saints". It has the benefit of being written directly by the Hebrew prophets, and the Apostles or their direct pupils. Anything that contradicts the Scripture cannot be of authentic Christianity (this is our contention against the Protestants). The Scripture is not, however, the entire Deposit of Faith and is in fact of a diffirent nature. Therefore, the scripture should be read, and read much. It is vital for educated men to read it and know what it contains; the excuse of invincible ignorance that the unevangelized once had has been exhausted and today salvation nearly wholly depends on following Christ known to most through the Scripture. But, the Scripture should be read in the company of the Early Church. The Fathers of the Church left us a legacy of scriptural interpretation that is not merely ANOTHER interpretation, on par with what a modern pastor might come up with. Theirs is the interpretation that listened to the Apostolic College. Let us attend.
Better answered by Fathers Rumble & Carty that by me:
588. I admit the force of Apostolic traditions for the early Christians. But they could be sure of them as we cannot today.
That is a dreadful statement. Were the Apostolic traditions part of the Christian faith then? Is it therefore impossible to know the full Christian truth now? Did Christ mean it when He said that He would be with His Church all days till the very end of the world? Or would you suggest that He meant it, but could not accomplish it? He sent the Church to teach all things, yet you say that it is impossible today. Be sure that the Catholic Church has all necessary traditions embodied in her teachings. Within her fold each succeeding generation of Bishops have taught faithful men who have been fit to teach others also. But you refuse to be taught by that Church. You rely upon your own fallible judgment. And as long as you adopt that method you will never be sure, not only of the Christian traditions, but even of the true Christian doctrine to be derived from Scripture itself.
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