Part one of this “How Did I Get Here” series begins with a brief overview of my theological beliefs over the last decade. You can read that post here. The second part of this series was less about my personal life and more about dominant philosophies (worldviews) of our day. By analyzing a debate between the modernist Noam Chomsky and the nihilistic, postmodernist Michel Foucault, I tried to highlight the hubris of these two worldviews as they compete for the authority to tell the world what is right, while neither one offering any justification for the belief that right or wrong exist at all. You can read that analysis here.

The reason I chose to make part two an analysis of the dominant worldviews of our day is to ultimately arrive here: the absurdity of sola scriptura, and thus, protestantism as an authentic expression of apostolic Christianity. In short, Protestantism (of any denomination) cannot justify the claim of Sola Scriptura.

By critiquing the baseless worldviews of both Noam Chomsky (Godless world with universals and therefore meaning) and Michel Foucault (Godless world with no universals and therefore no meaning) I showed how although these men disagree with one another, their worldviews lead to the same fundamental problems. Now I’m going to demonstrate how the modern protestant project is being plagued with a similar problem, though in reverse.

All protestants, unlike Chomsky and Foucault, agree on the starting point (Sola Scriptura), but disagree on the conclusion (what Scripture says). The great error for all protestants, however, is not their conclusions, but rather their inability to justify the starting point – sola scriptura.

Protestantism began as an attempt to preserve the original religion of the apostles by “reforming the deformed church” but very quickly morphed into a new-age, relativistic perennialism that would be unrecognizable by the reformers and completely foreign to the fathers of the apostolic church age.

Here we begin with the absolute foundation-stone upon which the doctrine of Sola Scriptura is established for all of Protestantism:

…the chief arguments of all Protestantism generally rest on the assumption that only the written texts are the Word of God, and that the Word Himself is only known from these. If this fails, then so does all of that system, since this is its sole foundation.

Jay Dyer, THE BIBLICAL NATURE OF SACRED TRADITION

It isn’t difficult to point out this error in conversation. The typical confession of sola scriptura goes something like this:

“As a Protestant Christian [Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Pentecostal, Non-Denominational, etc…] I confess and believe in the reformed doctrine that the written texts of the biblical canon are the only source of authority for Christian faith and practice.”

For Roman Catholics, the source of authority might be said to be the See of Rome – the Pope. For Protestants, the source of authority is the bible. For Orthodoxy, the source of authority is the Trinity.

If Christianity is true – that the eternal unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (the Trinity) together create and maintain the existence and order of heaven and earth and of all things created and uncreated – then it follows that only that God can be the source of authority for Christian faith and practice. The Bible is not the Trinity, and yet you will often here protestants say things like, “we believe in the bible”, as though “in it they find salvation.” That quote, mind you, if what Jesus says to the Jews.

Before we continue, I want to stress that this in no way diminishes the important of sacred scripture. The Trinity is the center of our faith, not the Bible, though it is the confession of the Church that the scriptures give a witness to this truth. The meaning of the universe is revealed in the Incarnation of the Word of God in Jesus Christ and the institution of the new covenant church which He set up Himself. This reality is passed down through liturgy and is witnessed through the writing of the apostles (the bible) and the doctrines that have been passed down from the apostles to their heirs, according to the faith (tradition). The scriptures give a witness to this reality, they are not themselves, the reality.

The immediate critique from protestantism is very often “but I just don’t see that in scripture.” But, you see, this critique presupposes the doctrine of Sola Scriptura as being the means by which the church operates.

The church existed for hundreds of years as a unified institution, believing itself to be the continuation of the body of Christ without anything like the bible as we have it today. In fact, most people were illiterate until much later in history from the institution of the new covenant church.

This also poses another difficult question for protestants: “Which bible do you accept?” This question is impossible to answer apart from the tradition of the church. Either the bible was handed down as sacred writings to you as part of a greater “tradition” of the Christian Church, or you have the ability to determine what constitutes sacred for yourself. If it is the case that the Bible is handed down, then it follows that it is necessary to accept the other traditions that those same church fathers confessed as well. If you do not also accept the other traditions, then it means you believe that you are fully equipt to determine what is right and wrong with regards to Christian faith and practice – be that salvation, worship, etc.

So then, sola scriptura isn’t the actual starting point of Christian faith and practice for the Protestant, but rather, each individual’s own interpretation is the starting point for Christian faith and practice.

To put it another way, it isn’t the bible that determines truth, it is our individual interpretation of the bible that is the source of authority for Christian faith and practice.

Theology is not a matter of innovation. Truth doesn not change. The work of theology throughout history has not been a matter of innovation but articulation. It is the work of clearly stating what the church has always believed. This work has been undertaken by the bishops of the church throughout history by looking at the scriptures, but also the oral traditions that may not have been written, but were nevertheless the teachings of the apostles, as St. Paul writes in the second letter to the Thessalonians: “Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you were taught, whether by word or our epistle.”

For the sake of brevity, I will keep this critique short. There is much more I could say, and there are many others who have said it much more clearly and more forcefully than I can. I will leave you with a few questions to consider if you are proponent of Sola Scriptura:

• How do you know what books should be in the Bible?
• How do you know that you have the ability to understand the Bible?
• Where did you read in the Bible that you can understand what the Bible says on your own apart from the Church?
• How do you know that scripture is the exclusive source of authority for Christian faith and practice?
• Where in the Bible does it say the Bible is the exclusive source of authority?
• How did the Church of the first thousand years exist without a universal canon if the only source of authority for Christian faith and practice is the Bible?
• Why would St. Paul command his successors in Thessaloniki to teach and pass down all that he taught orally or in writing as the Word of God if the written texts of the letters of the canon are the only source of authority for Christian faith and practice?
• Who decided what books constitute the Bible?
• Can they change? If not, why not, and where is that in the Bible?
• How do you know Matthew’s Gospel is written by the apostle Matthew? Where is that in the Bible?

“You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”

2 Timothy 2:1-2

These questions are some of the ones that I could not answer.