How revelant is the Reformation for us today?

[BNR32FAN]

I notice you fail to answer the question at all on meaning of " bind and loose" from where authority of the pope and council derives.

You also fail to acknowledge the clear statement on " primacy of honour" acknowledged in council. The references are continuous if you look for them. Take the tome of Leo " there speaks Peter" - long before the schism, indeed all the way from iraneus to such as Augustine they quote the list of popes i.e. Bishops of Rome. Not surprising since that is the fulfilment of the holder of keys " called father" way back in Isaiah.

So the eastern bishops moved in. On whose authority is the question? I see the power of Peter to " bind and loose"
I do not see the power of a group of disparate bishops indeed the reverse " what he opens none can shut"

I repeat Protestants never have any sensible answers to what those verses mean, if not council or papal authority.

Actually I did address the primacy of honor and I stated that it was not a position of authority. Just like the rest of the pentarchy said.

 

[dms1972]

Why stop at the Reformation? We can go down the slippery slope until we hear the voice of John Lennon singing "Imagine". The Reformation is as relevant today as ever, the Five Solas are essential to Protestant Christianity. The moral of this story is, truth is timeless and has its origin in God. To say the Reformation is no longer relevant, is to say the truths the Reformers championed are no longer relevant, and this method can only lead to disaster. Some wise person once wrote, "those who forget history are doomed to repeat it". If you think moderns have come so far along intellectually and spiritually, try reading the Puritans. I think humanity as a whole is devolving.

Thanks for your comment. As you see I was asking about its relevance, which you have affirmed. I was also thinking that the reformation while it contains timeless truth, yet it was directed also to a particular state of affairs in the church of the 16th century. The positive principles of the reformation, the five solas are always relevant, but application needs to be contemporary which means being in touch with the spiritual condition as it is now in the churches, and of course that is going to vary, even as it did in the 1st century churches of Asia in the book of Revelation.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

Thanks for your comment. As you see I was asking about its relevance, which you have affirmed. I was also thinking that the reformation while it contains timeless truth, yet it was directed also to a particular state of affairs in the church of the 16th century. The positive principles of the reformation, the five solas are always relevant, but application needs to be contemporary which means being in touch with the spiritual condition as it is now in in the churches, and of course that is going to vary.

A major problem I see in so many mainline Protestant denominations today, comes out of turning away from the Reformation, away from the Five Solas. If she only held onto those truths, she would not be concerned with political correctness and the social Gospel, her mind would be on communicating timeless Biblical truths which transforms lives of believers, even today.

 

[Mountainmike]

So are you accepting the power to bind and loose or not?

And it is clear in the OT reference to keys " worn upon the shoulder" it is the symbol of an inherited office, so does not stop with Peter, also in NT that apostles appointed successors, which is clear in early church writings.

As for infallibility, that too was defined with a dogmatic statement to " bind and loose " on that controversy. That is infallibility is limited to papal statements ex cathedra, ( like Moses seat) There have been very few such statements. Just as authors of scripture only acted infallibly at very limited times.

The role of Peter is also head pastor " tend my sheep"

It is not surprising that like Protestants later orthodox wanted to diminish the authority of the see of Peter - to allow them to do their own thing.

But the problem is - that's clearly not what the bible says of the office of keys which is - " what he opens none can shut"

indeed what Jesus binds, ( assuming you now agree with bind and loose) with the keys and authority of Peter, orthodox have no power to loose, nor does Luther or Protestants. So the papacy must remain, till Jesus alone has the power to revoke it.



As iraneus points out, Rome is where true doctrine lies.

Where does Peter pass on his authority to bind & loose? Was it passed on to the other popes? If so then what happened to the 99 popes who sanctioned the inquisitions for 686 years and why did the Catholic Church officially apologize for the actions of the men who sanctioned the inquisitions if they had the authority to bind & loose?

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Theologically and inter-church discussion? Yes. That's only cause people still adhere to the Reformation principles of the Solas. It is relevant to anyone theologically inclined either for or against.

Politically? I am not sure. I would need to see where Protestantism holds any political or cultural influence.

 

[ubicaritas]

A major problem I see in so many mainline Protestant denominations today, comes out of turning away from the Reformation, away from the Five Solas. If she only held onto those truths, she would not be concerned with political correctness and the social Gospel, her mind would be on communicating timeless Biblical truths which transforms lives of believers, even today.

No offense but this sounds like the polemics from people who aren't interested in taking mainline Protestantism seriously, more than a thoughtful analysis. Some of our churches weren't even impacted by the Social Gospel very much because we were immigrant churches that didn't have much cultural importance at the time.

I am not out to put down your church, I just wish those not in the mainline would speak more kindly about many of us who really do struggle with our faith just as anybody else does. We aren't some champagne liberal set. We are in creaky old churches with aging congregations and because we are less sexy and exciting than many other evangelical churches, we often are suffering in all sorts of ways. But we try to be faithful to the Bible as we understand it.

 

[hedrick]

I know there’s this feeling that the Reformation is no longer relevant, but I don’t believe it. I agree with the Reformers’ judgement that tradition had diverged from Jesus’ intention. I don’t think the Reformers’ theology was perfect, but that was because they didn’t have the chance to rethinking everything at once. As long as you accept “always reforming” as part of the theory, and ask whether the Reformation was a good start, I think it was.

The problem is when you treat Reformation theology as a new Holy Tradition. In that case you may find that the modern Catholic Church has actually made some progress in reforming itself, and in some respects may be in better shape than Protestants that froze the faith at the 17th Century.

But that’s not a fair way to judge the results of the Reformation. if you follow continuing Scripture study, and continuing reformation of theology based on it, I think this is still completely relevant.

 

[ubicaritas]

I know there’s this feeling that the Reformation is no longer relevant, but I don’t believe it. I agree with the Reformers’ judgement that tradition had diverged from Jesus’ intention. I don’t think the Reformers’ theology was perfect, but that was because they didn’t have the chance to rethinking everything at once. As long as you accept “always reforming” as part of the theory, and ask whether the Reformation was a good start, I think it was.

That's especially true with Luther and the peasants revolt. He panicked over the social changes the Reformation was bringing on, especially in Germany, and he did some things that we today would see as horrible, such as endorsing the slaughter of peasants. So I think many reformers took a conservative approach because of the fear that was in the air that if too much change happened, Europe would be weak and overrun by the Turks.

They also had not fully developed critical tools. It took centuries to work out the documentary source hypothesis, but in 2011 it took only 11 minutes for a computer to figure out that it's almost certain that the Documentary Source Hypothesis (JEDP) is correct, and the first 5 books of the Bible were written by four authors.

 

[hedrick]

I think some Reformers also realized that if they departed too far from mainstream theology, they would get stomped. Hence a number of Protestant works had prefaces aimed at Catholic rulers saying "see how orthodox we are."

But still, I agree that they had had neither the time nor the tools to go much further.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

No offense but this sounds like the polemics from people who aren't interested in taking mainline Protestantism seriously, more than a thoughtful analysis. Some of our churches weren't even impacted by the Social Gospel very much because we were immigrant churches that didn't have much cultural importance at the time.

I am not out to put down your church, I just wish those not in the mainline would speak more kindly about many of us who really do struggle with our faith just as anybody else does. We aren't some champagne liberal set. We are in creaky old churches with aging congregations and because we are less sexy and exciting than many other evangelical churches, we often are suffering in all sorts of ways. But we try to be faithful to the Bible as we understand it.

No offense but I think you just made Luther in Heaven blush. Sorry but I am confident the Churches of the Reformation would not even consider marrying a gay couple in Holy matrimony in their Church. I am also confident they would not be supporters of gender neutral Scripture translations. I am also confident they would not support allowing women in pastoral positions. You may argue these are cultural differences, and indeed they are, but in no way reflect historical Christian culture. And yes I am serious, and take these issues serious.

 

[ubicaritas]

No offense but I think you just made Luther in Heaven blush. Sorry but I am confident the Churches of the Reformation would not even consider marrying a gay couple in Holy matrimony in their Church. I am also confident they would not be supporters of gender neutral Scripture translations. I am also confident they would not support allowing women in pastoral positions. You may argue these are cultural differences, and indeed they are, but in no way reflect historical Christian culture. And yes I am serious, and take these issues serious.

I admit some things have changed but it's sort of like the difference between Reformed or Conservative and Orthodox Judaism. It's a question of how we adapt to modernity and more knowledge of the world. Luther and Calvin had a very naive view of the history of the Bible, for instance, one that is almost certainly false (they thought Moses wrote the Pentateuch, and today we know with a great degree of certainty this is not so, that there are definitive stylistic differences in the text, owing to the 2011 research by Israeli scientists using computational linguistics analysis of the Torah).

 

[BNR32FAN]

So are you accepting the power to bind and loose or not?

And it is clear in the OT reference to keys " worn upon the shoulder" it is the symbol of an inherited office, so does not stop with Peter, also in NT that apostles appointed successors, which is clear in early church writings.

As for infallibility, that too was defined with a dogmatic statement to " bind and loose " on that controversy. That is infallibility is limited to papal statements ex cathedra, ( like Moses seat) There have been very few such statements. Just as authors of scripture only acted infallibly at very limited times.

The role of Peter is also head pastor " tend my sheep"

It is not surprising that like Protestants later orthodox wanted to diminish the authority of the see of Peter - to allow them to do their own thing.

But the problem is - that's clearly not what the bible says of the office of keys which is - " what he opens none can shut"

indeed what Jesus binds, ( assuming you now agree with bind and loose) with the keys and authority of Peter, orthodox have no power to loose, nor does Luther or Protestants. So the papacy must remain, till Jesus alone has the power to revoke it.



As iraneus points out, Rome is where true doctrine lies.

Iranaeus wrote that in 180AD almost 900 years before the East West schism when all of the Catholic Churches were one combined church. You say the Orthodox left but like I stated 4 out of 5 of the patriarchy rejected Rome’s authority as having supremacy over all the churches. Rome of course being the only one not to reject it. Your siding with the one church that wanted to make changes and the other 4 rejected the idea. That same one group (Rome) that went on to commit terrible atrocities against humanity in the name of Christianity while the other 4 churches held true to the original teachings of Jesus and the apostles. Remember that Jesus warned us of false prophets who are vicious wolves disguised as sheep. He said you can identify them by their actions. Compare the actions of the Roman church to the actions of the churches in Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Jerusalem. None of these churches committed such terrible atrocities. I’m not saying the church in Rome today is evil or that it is ungodly. But I will say that they refuse to admit their mistakes and try to cover it up with a bunch of garbage about being the one true apostolic church started by Peter. Yes they were part of the one true church and yes it was established by Peter and Paul but they both planted several churches and the Roman church left the original apostolic church and went their own way. Just because the Roman church was at one time part of the original Catholic Church doesn’t mean they still are today. I do have a lot of respect for many of their teachings but on the other hand I do despise some of their despicable tactics and doctrines both in the past and present. Honestly I think they are to puffed up with arrogance and power to admit their faults and fallibility. I think they fear they will lose their support if people knew the truth.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Rather than follow the teachings and traditions of men (or women), what Christians need to do today is what we have always needed to do: get back to Scripture, sound teaching and careful Biblical study. As we have been exhorted to "earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints. (Jude 3)

Yes, Yahweh's Word never changes, and people who seek Him by faith in Jesus find themselves in the same position as the disciples did in the first century with Jesus, and as written - at odds with groups they belonged to before, sometimes all their lives, even the parents can be the worse enemies at times. Still, turning to Yahweh, trusting Him to accomplish salvation in Jesus in this life and in the life to come, is still His Word to all who would be set free from sin and from the power of sin and of the devil.

i.e. the 'Reformation', 'protesting', is still going on and still necessary.

 

[DharmaChrsitian]

I refer to the Reformation of the 16th century (Calvin, Luther et al). Many changes in the world and in thought have taken place - first there was the Enlightenment, which did not penetrate everywhere equally, but more so in Germany, and France. In it the deistic and athestic motifs from the classics writes Peter Gay, possessed the minds of the young leaders of the enlightenment with a very powerful spiritual force, effecting what can only be described as conversions - away from Christianity. Now we have postmodernism which is in many ways a rejection of the optimism of the Enlightenment, and the myth of progress. Yet modernity is still with us. In the light of these changes should we get back into the writings and theology of the Reformation? Or is God doing something new today? Was the Reformation and its writings, theology only relevant to the situation of that age, or is it still relevant today. Are some aspects relevant and others not? Which are relevant for today?

Clearly our civilization is entering into a new era, the rate at which information can be shared has been increased exponentially since the rise of the internet. This parallels the emergence of the printing press at the beginning of the Reformation, and makes available a whole new model for the church. The Reformers realized that, in a world where books could be mass produced, everyone could read the scriptures. That changed the entire infrastructure of religion in the West, and gave license for Luther to prosecute the egregious corruption of the old church, which was built on an old model of limited technology. Today we're facing an interesting parallel. My own perception of the reformers is that they were both extremely intelligent and faithful, I often wonder what their theologies would have been like had they access to the modern world - multicultural libraries through the internet. The bible was the key for them, but the new movement is even more radically democratized and egalitarian, such that the Bible itself is the infrastructure of the old church that's being challenged. I wonder how that analogy strikes you.

Have you read Phyllis Tickle's book on the emerging Church?

It seem to me that the emphasis on deism in the enlightenment might not be a move away from the teachings of Christ, so much as away from the formalized social infrastructure of Christianity. It depends of course on how well you think the culture of Christianity embodies the teachings of Christ, but if, hypothetically, the church had been radically off-base, then a move away from culture of Christianity may be a move closer to Christ. Protestants understand this intuitively with the Reformers, because they assume the church is corrupt and the bible isn't, but consider the possibility that the construction of biblical canon was itself just as corrupt as the Catholic church Luther broke away from (modern liberal scholarship seems to suggest so). If that's true then a movement away from Scripture might actually be a movement back to Christ. Just a thought, I'm curious how it strikes you or anybody else in the thread.

(1)"Sola Scriptura" (Bible-alone) is NOWHERE in The Bible.
So it is a self-defeating assertion!
It fails its own test.....it ISN'T in the Bible.....SO; IT'S NOT TRUE!

Yeah, this has to be the most obvious thing. 'Sola Sciptura': not in scripture. The Bible never explicitly references itself, so it can't claim its own authority. Because of that, every Biblical phrase that seems to emphasize Biblical authority is just an interpretation we hold today, but not one that the biblical author intended.

A major problem I see in so many mainline Protestant denominations today, comes out of turning away from the Reformation, away from the Five Solas. If she only held onto those truths, she would not be concerned with political correctness and the social Gospel, her mind would be on communicating timeless Biblical truths which transforms lives of believers, even today.

Don't you think that it's possible to get this so-called 'social gospel' from the Bible? Isn't there a lot of emphasis on the ethical importance of prioritizing vulnerable communities in the prophets and the gospels? How do we come up with Sola Scriptura if it's not in the Bible? Doesn't that mean we have another source of knowledge that's as authoritative as the Bible? If not, why?

 

[Tayla]

How revelant is the Reformation for us today?

All of Protestantism is based on the teachings and doctrines and viewpoints of the reformers. The changes since then are minor.

 

[FireDragon76]

I've actually got a few books on my Kindle about what it means to be Lutheran in a post-Christian world. It's challenging because at first glance, Lutheranism seems to be very much at odds with many concerns people have in a postmodern world. And I think that is true of Evangelicalism in general.

https://www.amazon.com/Justification-Post-Christian-Society-Church-Research-ebook/dp/B00SICIU1I

 

[FireDragon76]

On the subject of Sola Scripture, theologian Donald Bloesch has some perceptive comments. Some Protestant Fundamentalist churches think they have the same view of authority as the Reformers - the Bible alone, but in fact they don't. Bloesch writes: "For the church of the Reformation the supreme authority is the Word and the Spirit, the Bible illumined by the Spirit in the context of the worshipping community of faith."

Anglophone Evangelical approaches to the Bible owe more to the Enlightenment, specifically Scottish Common Sense Realism. We even see something like this in some New Atheist objections to the Bible (it's just the other side of the coin).

Much that is seen as "that old time religion" in Evangelicalism is really quite recent, and fundamentalism tends to exaggerate elements of a past religious tradition while ignoring others.

 

[dms1972]

I agree with you FireDragon, in regard to much of Evangelicalism. Bloesch for instance seems to see in his reading of even a stalwart evangelical like Carl Henry only a call for a return to the rationalistic idealism of the early enlightenment.

I don't really think we have to return to a cosmology of the 1st century, or one of the Medieval Era, because in God's guiding of history the Holy Spirit has also been at work in modernity as well as the zeitgeist.

But there is a bit of a difference between Evangelicalism in America and in Britain. In British evangelical circles there has been less emphasis on the doctrines of Infallibility and Inerrancy. I am distinguishing evangelical and fundamentalist, the latter are more interested in inerrancy.

I don't think its possible to speak of a 'post-christian world' however unless we clarify that term. There are parts of the world were the Gospel has not yet made significant penetration - Japan for instance. While modernity has had an impact there, many Japanese remain quite traditional.

We don't quite live in a post-christian world. I'd say rather that there are several currents at work, the main ones being, the Christian stream, a New Enlightenment stream (faith in science, technology), and a third stream which includes elements of oriental mysticism, and New Age beliefs.

Another way to look at what is going on is by way of Augustine's model of the Two Cities - the City of God, and the City of Man, both of which disclose a pattern of cyclical decline and revival.

 

[dms1972]

Clearly our civilization is entering into a new era, the rate at which information can be shared has been increased exponentially since the rise of the internet. This parallels the emergence of the printing press at the beginning of the Reformation, and makes available a whole new model for the church. The Reformers realized that, in a world where books could be mass produced, everyone could read the scriptures. That changed the entire infrastructure of religion in the West, and gave license for Luther to prosecute the egregious corruption of the old church, which was built on an old model of limited technology. Today we're facing an interesting parallel. My own perception of the reformers is that they were both extremely intelligent and faithful, I often wonder what their theologies would have been like had they access to the modern world - multicultural libraries through the internet. The bible was the key for them, but the new movement is even more radically democratized and egalitarian, such that the Bible itself is the infrastructure of the old church that's being challenged. I wonder how that analogy strikes you.

Have you read Phyllis Tickle's book on the emerging Church?

It seem to me that the emphasis on deism in the enlightenment might not be a move away from the teachings of Christ, so much as away from the formalized social infrastructure of Christianity. It depends of course on how well you think the culture of Christianity embodies the teachings of Christ, but if, hypothetically, the church had been radically off-base, then a move away from culture of Christianity may be a move closer to Christ. Protestants understand this intuitively with the Reformers, because they assume the church is corrupt and the bible isn't, but consider the possibility that the construction of biblical canon was itself just as corrupt as the Catholic church Luther broke away from (modern liberal scholarship seems to suggest so). If that's true then a movement away from Scripture might actually be a movement back to Christ. Just a thought, I'm curious how it strikes you or anybody else in the thread.




Yeah, this has to be the most obvious thing. 'Sola Sciptura': not in scripture. The Bible never explicitly references itself, so it can't claim its own authority. Because of that, every Biblical phrase that seems to emphasize Biblical authority is just an interpretation we hold today, but not one that the biblical author intended.



Don't you think that it's possible to get this so-called 'social gospel' from the Bible? Isn't there a lot of emphasis on the ethical importance of prioritizing vulnerable communities in the prophets and the gospels? How do we come up with Sola Scriptura if it's not in the Bible? Doesn't that mean we have another source of knowledge that's as authoritative as the Bible? If not, why?

Does the Bible not reference itself when it says : "Every scripture inspired of God [is] also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness..." 2 Timothy 3:16? I think the Bible does reference itself.

The Monks in the middle ages didn't only preserve the Christian Scriptures, they preserved a lot of other writing from antiquity also. That was the multi-cultural library of the time that the Reformers had access to. Scripture Alone means scripture is to be the final authority in matters of faith.

Many of the writings of the Reformers themselves I would not have had access to 25 years ago commercially, and even in a good library I might have only found a small selection, but now they can be found on the Reformation Ink website, which is very useful.

The emerging church is partly right and partly wrong (its also not quite a monolithic movement). The emerging aspect is that they are emerging from Evangelical rationalism which is influenced by the Enlightenment. There is more emphasis on relational christianity, and less on doctrine and propositional truth. But quite often it represents one side of a false dichotomy, in that it doesn't have to be relational against propositional truth. Its also quite strange at times who gets classed as being 'emergent', for instance, some more fundamentalist groups would place the late Dallas Willard as a leader in the emergent church movement. Willard himself has said his outlook was fairly Calvinistic, albeit he does see professing perfect doctrine as of secondary importance to having a living relationship with God the Father through Christ.

Deism is a move away from an Incarnational form of Christianity.