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To: Mrs. Don-o
In the historic Christian sense, that would include the Apostles' teaching, their written memoirs, the way of prayer and way of life they transmitted to the original Christian communities.

But of course this is not falsifiable in any way, nor provable, unless demonstrated from original/contemporaneous sources before 100ad.

You are left with a game of telephone. And in the case of Rome, there are many things never taught by an Apostle, nor practiced before 100ad that are doctrines and practices. This includes pagan practices.

As you can see, that comprises Scripture (the part that was written down by the Apostles' own hand or by their scribes) as well as their preaching and example.

No, it doesn't fully comprise Scripture. This was the problem with your original claim.

Scripture stands alone as authoritative, verifiable and sufficient.

with a fresh coffee in front of me

Something we can agree on!

15 posted on 07/18/2018 9:54:53 AM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion
If you're going to obey St. Paul's command that we "hold on to the traditions which ye have been taught" you're going to need some kind of canon (Gr: "measuring rod") or rule to sort out Apostolic teaching from Grandma's recipes. It can't be everything; and it can't be nothing.

Note: the early churches observed some reliable canon (measuring rod) for centuries, since the selection of the books of Scripture from a much bigger collection of NT-era literature itself was based on what they knew before it was even written.

First, we only know who the authors of the Four Gospels were, via a "tradition" not contained in the texts themselves. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are identified as such by those who collected them accepted them, copied and circulated them. They were not signed or identified internally when they were written.

How do we know "John" wrote "The Gospel according to John"? Tradition. Big "T" Tradition, controlled by the Holy Spirit.

You can verify this by looking at that Bible you've got on your desk. The Gospel manuscripts themselves were written anonymously.

Even the Apostles Creed was written, and the first Ecumenical Council's Christological beliefs defined (e.g. "Christ is and was always God") before the NT Scriptures themselves were canonized.

By God's action, by the power of the Holy Spirit, this was the foundation! It was on the basis of these beliefs, that canonical books were distinguished from non-canonical.

("The Church, the pillar and foundation of the Truth." You can't deflect it as "a game of telephone." Hit the DELETE button Tradition, and the New Testament disappears from your screen.

So they must have criteria. What were the criteria?

The "Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus" definition is "What always, everywhere, and by everybody is/was believed."

Get rid of the Vincentian canon, and you've gotten rid of --- the Canon.

16 posted on 07/18/2018 11:11:00 AM PDT by Mrs. Don-o ("The Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth." - 1 Timothy 3:15)
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