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The Patristic Era Church Also Rejected Paul's Predestination Doctrine
Further proof of the low regard for Paul can be seen in the early church's view of predestination. The early church from 125 A.D. to 325 A.D. universally rejected Paul's teachings on predestination. Paul was not named, but they universally regarded his teaching as blasphemy and impiety of the worst sort. Justin Martyr died in 165 A.D. by preferring execution than to renounce his faith in Christ. He explained: We have learned it from the prophets, and we hold it to be true, that punishments, chastisements, and rewards are rendered according to each man's actions. Otherwise, if all things happen by fate, then nothing is in our own power. For if it is predestined that one man be good and another man evil, then the first is not deserving of praise or the other to be blamed. Unless humans have the power of avoiding evil and choosing good by free choice, they are not accountable for their actions--whatever they may be.... (Justin, First Apology, ch. 43.) Clement, Archelaus, and Methodius all spoke against predestination, and in favor of free-will. 23 The Epistle of Second Peter also reflects this early rejection of predestination. It states that God "is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance." (2 Peter 3:9.) If God is not willing any should perish but predestination of the lost were true, then God would not be willing to have happen what He supposedly predestines to happen. God would be schizophrenic. Evidently because 2 Peter 3:9 refutes predestination, Calvin was willing to reject the entire epistle as inspired. Calvin held tightly to Pauline predestination. Calvin declared Second Peter a false addition to scripture. 24 Indeed, Second Peter likely is a pseudograph. Yet, even as such, 2 Peter 3:9 is still an early fourth century reflection of church doctrine. It proves the post-apostolic age rejected predestination of the lost. Methodius, a Christian martyr from the late 200s, likewise said predestination doctrine was an impious (blasphemous) claim. He wrote: Those who say that man does not have free will, but say that he is governed by the unavoidable necessities of fate, are guilty of impiety toward God himself, making Him out to be the cause and author of human evils. (Methodius, The Banquet of the Ten Virgins, Discourse 8, ch. 6.) Methodius was not exaggerating the meaning behind Paul's writings on predestination. Calvin in explaining Paul's writings says Paul means that God predestines all evil--God actually directs all evil thoughts with its evil outcome. God does not merely allow evil to happen by God's permissive will. Calvin insists Paul means God makes all evil happen. 25 It was not until Luther that predestination resurfaced as a doctrine again. Luther went even farther than Augustine in drawing out Paul's meaning. Luther insisted Paul meant God damns the lost to hell without any free-will opportunity to accept Jesus. He said that Paul's doctrine takes great faith because God "saves so few and damns so many" yet we must believe God is "just" despite His own will "makes [the lost] necessarily damnable." (Martin Luther, Bondage of the Will.) Even though this makes God abominable, Luther skates the issue by saying "it is not lawful" to ask why God does not "change this fault of will in every man." Thus, Luther thought you proved you had great faith when you could believe Paul is correct that God is still just despite doing something so apparently unjust as damning people while depriving them of the ability of accept Him. Neither Luther nor Calvin stopped and asked whether Paul could be inspired when Paul ascribes such incongruous impious behavior to God. More important, the post-apostolic rejection of predestination from 125-325 A.D. proves that the universal church was still following Jesus' words alone. Without naming Paul specifically, they rejected every word of Paul at odds with Jesus. In particular they rejected the notion that the lost were damned due to God's predetermined will. Rather, God is not willing that any should perish. (John 3:16; cf. 2 Peter 3:9.) Calvin's writings indirectly corroborate Bercot's conclusion. Calvin could not find anyone other than Augustine from the late 300s who agreed with Paul's doctrines. And Augustine's agreement was limited only to Paul's predestination doctrine. The Patristic Era Also Blasted Paul's Doctrine on Eating Idol MeatWe previously demonstrated that Paul three times expresses complete indifference if a Christian eats meat sacrificed to idols. Paul would prohibit it only being eaten in front of a weaker brother who thinks an idol is something. (Romans 14:21;1 Corinthians 8:4-13, and 1 Corinthians 10:19-29.) In the Patristic Era (125-325 A.D.), Paul's teaching was condemned with no thought of even discussing Paul. Irenaeus (120-202 A.D.) wrote in his Against Heresies, chapter XXIV, that Saturninus and Basilides were heretics because: He attaches no importance to [the question regarding] meats offered in sacrifice to idols, thinks them of no consequence, and makes use of them without any hesitation; he holds also the use of other things, and the practice of every kind of lust, a matter of perfect indifference. By today's standards, however, Saturninus and Basilides are not heretics on the issue of idol meat. They simply took time to read Paul's words. They got the issue straightened out by Paul's clear permission to eat such meat. However, Irenaeus' view is so clearly opposed to Paul's teaching that it reminds us how little regard anyone had for Paul's words back then. However, the most intriguing quote on this issue is Irenaeus' criticism of Valentinus as a heretic. In book II of Against Heresies, chapter XIV, we read: Again, their opinion as to the indifference of [eating of] meats and other actions, and as to their thinking that, from the nobility of their nature, they can in no degree at all contract pollution, whatever they eat or perform, they have derived it from the Cynics, since they do in fact belong to the same society as do these [philosophers]. They also strive to transfer to [the treatment of matters of] faith that hairsplitting and subtle mode of handling questions which is, in fact, a copying of Aristotle. Irenaeus precisely condemned the hair-splitting quibbling with God's commands that Paul utilized himself. Paul troubles us with questions such as `do you think an idol is really something?' Can't you eat it `if you don't believe in idols'? No one back in the Patristic era showed any appreciation for Paul's teaching or methodology in how to interpret God's commands. You did not try to find hair-splitting ways to devise exceptions to commands. You simply obeyed God's word. What Explains Almost Two Millennia of Ignoring Paul's Teachings?As demonstrated above at Patristic Era (125-325 A.D.) Rejected Paul's Salvation Doctrine, all the churches founded by the apostles never taught after the apostles had died that salvation was by faith alone without works. Instead, all the apostolic churches taught salvation was by a faith that zealously seeks after God plus works. This formula was not only true in the pre-Roman Catholic era (125-325 A.D.), but in the post-Catholic era from 325 A.D. to the present within the territories that comprised the Roman empire.26 Likewise, salvation by faith-plus-works based on Jesus' words continued on in the East where the Orthodox church flourished. For fourteen hundred post-apostolic years, no one other than Marcion, the Paulicians, and Pelagius (410 A.D.) taught salvation by faith alone without works.27 Yet all three were regarded universally by Christendom to be heretics. Furthermore, for fourteen hundred post-apostolic years no one taught predestination or the bondage of the will except during a small episode where it appears in Augustine's writings from the 300s. Augustine endorsed these doctrines to condemn Pelagius as a heretic. However, Augustine's ideas on predestination and free-will never became official teachings of the Roman Catholic church. Once Pelagius was found a heretic, the issue died off. The Roman church instead always has taught humans have free-will. God foreknows whom He will save, but He does not compel them to believe. 28 Another example was that in the entire post-apostolic era, no Christian leader ever agreed with Paul's teaching that we could eat meat sacrificed to idols. Paul's indifference on the issue was soundly condemned whenever discussed in the early church. Thus, between 125 A.D. and 1517 A.D., no church body took Paul seriously. Only Marcion did. Only Pelagius did. Only Augustine did on predestination as a temporary tool to destroy Pelagius. However, Pelagius--a pariah of Reformed theology--not only taught free-will but also Paul's doctrine of salvation by faith alone. (See footnote 27 below.) Yet, Pelagius and the Marcionites were expelled from the church in both East and West as heretics! The Eastern Orthodox Church & PaulWe in the West often ignore there was an older and wider church than Roman Catholicism: the Orthodox. Its view on Pauline doctrine deserves great respect due to its antiquity. This original church is still going strong with 250 million members. (Protestantism represents, by comparison, only 350 million members worldwide.) We know the Orthodox today in the West as the Eastern Orthodox church. The Orthodox church has continuously flourished from the first century in Israel, Ethiopia, Egypt, Turkey, Syria, etc. Each national church traces their roots to James as the first bishop of Jerusalem. They insist it was to him alone that the original bishops looked to for guidance. ("Eastern Orthodox Church," Encarta.) The Orthodox maintain an unbroken list of bishops in all its original territories (including Rome), tracing back name-by-name right down to the period of James and Paul. As Paul says, the Jerusalem church, in those earliest days, was regarded as the "mother of us all." (Cf. Gal. 4:21-26.) But isn't the Roman Catholic Church the original church? No. This is pure myth. The original church was the one founded at Jerusalem and led by James, described in Acts chapter 15. Ten years later, Peter went to Rome and founded a church there. Peter also had founded a church at Antioch in Syria. 29 Neither the one at Rome nor at Antioch could claim superiority over the other. Each was founded by Peter. Furthermore, prior to the 300s, the bishops throughout the Roman and non-Roman world operated as one inter-connected Christian church. There was no single head except initially James at Jerusalem. In the 300s, the Roman bishop, with the power of the Emperor behind him, began to exert direct control over churches within the Roman territories. This led to the Roman bishop (aka the pope) developing doctrines divergent from the bishops outside of Roman territorial control. These Orthodox Christian bishops outside the control of Rome in 1054 excommunicated the bishop of Rome (aka the pope). Particularly irksome to the original church of Christ was that the Roman bishop (aka the pope) had developed doctrines on purgatory and original sin which the Eastern bishops rejected. However, the grounds of divorce in 1054, also known as the Great Schism, rested upon the fact that the bishop of Rome (aka the pope) altered the Nicene Creed. Since then, the bishops outside of Roman influence have called themselves the Orthodox Church. As already noted, we in the West call them and their 250 million members the Eastern Orthodox Church. What is the Orthodox Church's view on Paul's teachings? Despite Paul's presence in their New Testament canon, the Orthodox church's official salvation doctrine as far back as the post-apostolic records take us (125 A.D.) up through today completely ignores Paul. Not a single doctrine of Paul surfaces in the Orthodox' church doctrine. Not the doctrine of original sin from Romans chapter 5 (which the Orthodox specifically reject). Not predestination of the will. Not total depravity. Not grace alone. Not faith alone. Not one iota of anything uniquely Pauline appears in the official teachings of the Orthodox church from the earliest post-apostolic records to the present. As one Calvinist Reformed writer puts it in his critique of the Eastern Orthodox: Eastern Orthodox Christians reject the Reformed [i.e., Pauline] teaching of the natural man's bondage of the will as well as the Doctrines of Grace. They reject the Reformed view of Predestination....They reject the doctrine of justification by grace alone through faith alone. The Orthodox reject the biblical idea (Romans 5) of inherited (imputed) guilt...Orthodox hold to baptismal regeneration--no one can be saved unless he is baptized with water.30 For the Orthodox, only the words of Christ and His twelve apostles have influence over belief and practice. Their foremost creed was the Nicene Creed (325 A.D.). To this day, they insist it is the most accurate summary of the faith of the Church. Yet, this Creed too contains nothing uniquely from Paul! So what does the Eastern Orthodox church teach about salvation? Most succinctly, it teaches you have to stay on the narrow road of following Jesus. This aims at being perfect in conduct, obeying all of Jesus' commands. We will never be perfect while on earth, but starting with baptism and following Jesus we will become more and more like God in perfection. This is called theosis. It means becoming like God by imitation, not like God in one's nature. For support, they rely upon Jesus' words: "whoever obeys my teaching should never ever die." (John 8:51.) When one sins, the Orthodox urge repentance and penance. Their doctrines are heavily focused therefore on Jesus' teachings. The Orthodox wholly ignore Paul's unique doctrines. In fact, perhaps most startlingly of all, the Orthodox have an unbroken string of twenty centuries of ongoing belief in the validity of the true Saturday Sabbath. This is hardly a Pauline view. This was the early church's practice as well. 31 The Orthodox' views on salvation are hard to amalgamate in our way of thinking because of our long conditioning to Paulinism. We need to mull over their ideas. They are calling for an internal transformation, not merely a verbal or internal confession of some knowledge about Jesus. When we realize this is their point, it is truly closer to Christ's teaching. It completely ignores the Paulinist-inspired teachings of the Western church that focus on a mental belief change. Regardless, what cannot be denied is the Orthodox represent a longer tradition than Roman Catholicism. Their doctrines are deeply rooted in the post-apostolic period of 125 A.D. to 325 A.D. Yet, it thoroughly rejects everything that Paul uniquely stands for. Are all 250 million Orthodox Christians lost because they emphasize Jesus' words? Whatever the answer, the history of the Orthodox church proves one thing: Paul early on and a long time thereafter was never taken seriously. Protestants Agree For 1400 Years No One Had The Correct Salvation FormulaProtestant historians agree. For over fourteen centuries after the death of the apostles, the Protestant story agrees that Paul was never followed by the official churches, either East or West. It was Luther who alone in this period first discovered Paul in what eventually became a large-scale movement. "But when we say Luther `rediscovered' this [salvation] doctrine, we are implying that the doctrine had been lost or obscured between the New Testament era and Luther's day." 32 I will label this the Luther Rediscovery Thesis. However, in this Luther Rediscovery Thesis, this departure from true Christianity includes the post-apostolic era in both East and West. This Luther Rediscovery Thesis brands all the churches founded by the twelve apostles as quickly having become heretical. It is not merely the Roman Bishop who strays. Rather, all the bishops everywhere all simultaneously became heretical. This has to include what we know today as the Eastern Orthodox who never were under the control of the Roman Catholic Church. At the outset, the Orthodox bishops were far more numerous and territorially larger than Roman Catholicism. They grew independent from the bishop of Rome (i.e., whom we today call pope). They even later excommunicated the Roman pope in 1054 for his innovations on the apostolic faith. These Orthodox Christians existed in Egypt, Ethiopia, Carthage, Turkey, and numerous other regions of the Middle-East. Thus, the Luther Rediscovery Thesis insists the Orthodox--although independent from the RCC--departed simultaneously into heresy. The Luther Rediscovery Thesis also teaches the early church leaders in the Western territories between 125-325 A.D. simultaneously turned heretical. This cannot be attributed to Roman Catholic corruption. There was not yet any papacy at Rome that could exert its influence as binding over Polycarp, Papias, Irenaeus, Origen, Justin Martyr and many others in the West. These voices are simply students of the apostles, not disciples of the bishop (pope) of Rome. In fact, none of these men knew of a Roman papacy as we do today. There were no Roman catechisms to which they had to conform. Such catechisms came much later--after the emperor Constantine (post-325 A.D.) and his successors gave muscle to the words of the bishop of Rome. 33 Thus, the Luther Rediscovery Thesis must also explain how in the Western pre-papist Roman church these early leaders from 125-325 A.D. quickly abandoned apostolic teachings if the apostles shared Paul's peculiar doctrines. In sum, we can see the Luther Rediscovery Thesis has a fatal problem when it comes to the validity of Paul's salvation doctrine. It suffers from the same notion that Marcion had--he claimed that he alone found the true gospel in Paul twenty to eighty years after the Twelve Apostles died. In response to Marcion, Tertullian in 207 A.D. ridiculed this idea. Tertullian's language is even more apt for the modern claim that the church suffered 1400 years of error of ignoring Paul in the early post-apostolic churches everywhere. Tertullian skewered Marcion's similar claim, saying: [I insist that] no other teaching will have the right of being received as apostolic than that which is at the present day proclaimed in the churches of apostolic foundation. You will, however, find no church of apostolic origin but such as reposes its Christian faith in the Creator [being the same in the Hebrew Scriptures as in the new]. But if the churches shall prove to have been corrupt from the beginning, where shall the pure ones be found? Will it be amongst the adversaries of the Creator [i.e., Marcion saying the God of the New is not the God of the Old]? Show us, then, one of your churches, tracing its descent from an apostle, and you will have gained the day. (Tertullian, Against Marcion, 1.23.) 34 The same point holds true here. If one believes the Luther Rediscovery Thesis, one has to believe the very same churches founded by the twelve apostles were corrupt soon after the apostles died, missing out on Paul's teachings. You are being asked to believe this happened simultaneously among diverse churches in diverse locations even though there was no single controlling bishop after 70 A.D. The bishops in the 125-325 A.D. period did not yet know of a superior council that could impose doctrine on everyone simultaneously. Yet, despite this diffuse spread of churches, run by independent bishops, we cannot find a single church tracing to one of the twelve from the Patristic Era who ever espouses Paul's core salvation doctrines. None teach his ideas of predestination. None teach his ideas of total depravity. None teach his ideas of salvation by faith alone. Instead, Paul's doctrines were universally rejected. Tertullian rightly argues in the case of Marcion that such facts invalidate some late discovery previously not taught in any early apostolic church. Here, Paulinists assume there was 1400 years of darkness. Neither Paul's salvation doctrine nor most of his unique doctrines can be found in the apostolic early church. Instead, Paul's major doctrines were ignored for 1400 years until Luther `rediscovered' them. Tertullian's logic is right. It is absurd to believe that the early bishops at diffuse and separate churches which had been founded by the apostles could reject Paul's doctrines unless such rejection was indeed the orthodox view of the original twelve apostles themselves. The lesson for us is we need to steer back to Jesus' words as the sole test of orthodoxy. If you cannot find justification for a doctrine in Jesus' words or the inspired Scripture that preceded Jesus, then you do not have to follow it. If a doctrine is proposed, whether from Paul or anyone else, that does not line up with Jesus' words or the inspired Scripture that preceded Jesus, then it is not possibly a prophetic voice. We must not fall into the same trap the Young Prophet suffered when he trusted the Old Prophet who permitted him to do what God previously prohibited. (1 Kings 13.) We must not elevate such a voice to respect as inspired. 1. This work is reprinted at http://www.orthodox.net/faq/canon.htm. 2. Hans von Campenhausen, The Formation of the Christian Canon (J. A. Baker, trans.) (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1972) at 167. 3. Professor George Howard recently re-published a medieval text that has the earmarks of this Hebrew original Matthew. It was preserved ironically by a Jewish critic of Christianity as an appendix to his rebuttal work to Christianity. It reads virtually identical to our current version. Yet, its variances repair some textual errors in our Greek New Testament (e.g., Jesus' ascribes the 30 pieces of silver in the Hebrew Matthew to Zechariah, but our Greek NT version ascribes this erroneously to the prophet Jeremiah). Thus, this Hebrew Matthew must be closer to the original Matthew. For more information, see the Hebrew Matthew at www.jesuswordsonly.com. See also, Nehemiah Gordon, Hebrew Yeshua versus the Greek Jesus (Jerusalem: 2006). 4. You can find this work--patched together from various sources--at http://www.marcionite-scripture.info/antithesis.html. I have also preserved a copy at Antithesis of Marcion. 5. See "Paulicians," Catholic Encyclopedia. It mentions they "[1]rejected the Old Testament...[2][T]o believe in him [Jesus] saves men from judgment....[3] Their Bible was a fragmentary New Testament." In N. G. Garsoïan, The Paulician Heresy (1968), it mentions "The sect especially valued the Gospel of Luke and the Pauline Epistles." 6. Tertullian, Adversus Marcionem (ed. trans.) (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972) at 262-63, Book 4, chapter 2. It is available online at http://www.tertullian.org/articles/evans_marc/evans_marc_10book4_eng.htm (accessed 2005). 7. In Luke 14:26, Luke says Jesus said, "If any man cometh unto me, and hateth not his own father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." 8. Clarke realizes the contradiction between Luke & Matthew, and the terrible import of Luke's variance. He says "Matt. 10:37 expresses the true meaning" of Jesus. Gill likewise sees the problem in Luke, saying Jesus could not have uttered a command to hate, for this would be contrary "to the laws of God...and divine revelation." He says Matthew is a better "explanation" of Jesus' meaning. 9. For the doubting Thomas' over this Oxford translation, the Latin original confirms this is correct. It is: "Porro Lucas non apostolus sed apostolicus, non magister sed discipulus, utique magistro minor, certe tanto posterior quanto posterioris apostoli sectator, Pauli sine dubio." 11. Tertullian, Against Marcion (Oxford University Press, 1972) at 509, 511, reprinted online at http://www.tertullian.org/articles/evans_marc/evans_marc_12book5_eng.htm. 12. Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics, Ch. XXIV, available online from http://www.tertullian.org/anf/anf03/anf03-24.htm, quoting entire text from Anti-Nicene Fathers Vol. III. 13. You can find this at Calvin College's online resources at http://ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-03/anf03-28.htm#P3804_1266834 14. Paul teaches we are all enemies of God, but God then bestowed His mercy on us while we were yet sinners. (Rom. 5:10.) Tertullian says this is absurd because he believes there are those who seek after God. The Lord Almighty should pick them to bestow His mercy. Tertullian is basing this on Jesus' clear teaching of the saved fourth seed who had prior to hearing the word been a good and noble heart. (Luke 8:15.) However, a Paulinist does not acknowledge ever that such a person exists. Yet, the Bible teaches they do exist: e.g., Job 1:1, 8. 15. Tertullian's chapter title is interesting: "Dangerous Effects to Religion and Morality of the Doctrine of So Weak a God." He saw eternal security as a threat to morality. Tertullian repeats this attack on eternal security forcefully in his book The Scorpion's Bite (207 A.D.) He felt the doctrine sapped the resolve of those under persecution. Many were teaching that if you denied Christ, Christ would not deny you and you remained saved (quoting Paul in 2 Timothy). Tertullian regarded this eternal security doctrine as the Scorpion's Bite. 16. David W. Bercot, Will the Real Heretics Please Stand Up: A New Look at Today's Evangelical Christianity in the light of Early Christianity (Texas: Scroll Publishing, 1999) at 57. 18. Josh McDowell, Evidence that Demands A Verdict (San Bernardino, CA: Here's Life, 1972) at 50-52. 19. A reprint online from the Roberts-Donaldson translation is at http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/2clement-roberts.html (last accessed 2005). 20. If you go to www.earlychristianwritings.com, every time a verse is discussed in a patristic writing, it is linked. However, neither Romans 8:1 nor 8:39 are ever once cited by any patristic-era `father.' See, http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/e-catena/romans8.html (last accessed 2005). 21. The epistle is available online from Calvin College at http://ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-01/anf01-11.htm#P776_145896 (last accessed 2005). 22. Ironically, it was Augustine who formulated all the core problematical doctrines of Roman Catholicism too. Thus, Calvin thought Augustine was heretical on almost everything but Paul's doctrine of predestination. Why should Calvin think someone so heretical on so many doctrines could be correct about just these few points? 25. Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion Book 1, ch. XVIII. For example, Calvin writes that God "directs [Satan and his angels'] malice to whatever end he pleases, and employs their iniquities to execute his judgments." (Institutes, Ch. XVIII, Book 1, No. 1) Calvin says some dishonestly seek to evade this truth by claiming a distinction between God permitting evil and doing evil. But God "himself, however, openly declare[s] that he does this, [and hence God] repudiates the evasion." Id. Calvin means that God's word insists He does the evil. He does not merely permit it. Another example is Calvin says: "That men do nothing save at the secret instigation of God, and do not discuss and deliberate on anything but what he has previously decreed with himself, and brings to pass by his secret direction, is proved by numberless clear passages of Scripture." Id. Later Calvin, twisting Scripture, insists: "The fiction of bare permission [of evil] is at an end," meaning it is false that God merely permits evil rather than directs it. Id. It was largely this blasphemous teaching that first led me to ever question the doctrine of the Presbyterian church I attended. 26. The Roman Catholic Church at the Council of Trent (ca. 1543), in its Sixth Session on Justification, declared as heretical two teachings in particular: (1) that "the sinner is justified by faith alone" (Canon 9) and (2) that "men are justified either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ or by the sole remission of sins...." (Canon 11.) 27. A little known fact about Pelagius is that he taught salvation was by faith alone. In Augustine's attacks on him as a heretic, he focused on Pelagius' belief that human free-will could, in theory, permit one to live a sinless life. Augustine never revealed what truly made Pelagius dangerous. Pelagius was resorting to Marcion's doctrine that Paul taught salvation by faith alone. Zimmer in the modern era discovered a work by Pelagius that was spared destruction. It survived because it was miscatalogued as a work of Jerome. In it, Pelagius defends that free-will allows one to live a sinless life. However, in this same book entitled Commentary on the Epistle of St. Paul (410 A.D.), Pelagius is a proponent of salvation by faith alone, without repentance. Pelagius even ridiculed James' doctrines. The Catholic Encyclopedia comments on this modern discovery, noting Pelagius taught: "By justification we are indeed cleansed of our personal sins through faith alone (loc. cit., 663, `per solam fidem justificat Deus impium convertendum'), but this pardon (gratia remissionis) implies no interior renovation of sanctification of the soul." (Zimmer, "Realencyklopädies fur protest," Theologie XV, 753 (Leipzig, 1904.) The Catholic Encyclopedia comments: "Luther's boast of having been the first to proclaim the doctrine of abiding faith [must be re-evaluated because] Pelagius [earlier] insists expressly (loc. cit. 812), `Ceterum sine operibus fidei, non legis, mortua est fides.' [transl. "Moreover, without the work of faith, not of law, faith is dead."] Pelagius was making fun of James by twisting his words around to sound Pauline. This raises the question whether Augustine went after Pelagius merely on the issue of capacity of free-will to avoid sin or because Pelagius rejected James' teaching in favor of Paul's on salvation. For more on this, see "Pelagius," Catholic Encyclopedia, reprinted at http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11604a.htm (last visited 2005). 28. In 1520, Luther attacked the doctrine of free-will. Pope Leo X condemned Luther's claims. Erasmus, a Catholic reformer, in 1524 rebutted Luther, pointing out that if man lacks a free-will ability to do good, then God is unjust to condemn man for sin. Luther's response in 1525 was to say that Paul's doctrine of grace excludes any ability of man to contribute positively toward his salvation. Otherwise salvation would be by works. However, Luther's response did not address the question posed by Erasmus: how can God condemn the lost if they have no free-will ability to do good? Regardless, this episode demonstrates that Paul's doctrines are used to defend the notion that man lacks free-will to do good. Paul teaches God gives man a will bound to evil unless God `in His infinite wisdom' having nothing to do with our behavior decides to spare some. God then infuses the few with the will to believe and be saved. Then, and only then, can man do good. For Jesus' contrary teaching, see Jesus' Idea of Faith at www.jesuswordsonly.com. 31. As one encyclopedia says, the "Eastern Orthodox churches distinguish between `the sabbath' (Saturday) and `the Lord's day' (Sunday), and both continue to play a special role for the believers...though the Lord's day with the weekly Liturgy is clearly given more emphasis. Catholics put little emphasis on that distinction and most of them, at least in colloquial language, speak of Sunday as the sabbath." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabbath.) Thus, the Orthodox not only reject all uniquely Pauline teachings, they also reject Paul's fright over the Galatians observing "days" (Sabbath). (Gal.4:10.) Irenaeus (130-202 A.D.) of Lyon, France gave the early rationale at total odds with Paul. "The decalogue [Ten Commandments] however was not cancelled by Christ, but is always in force: men were never released from its commandments." ("Against Heresies," Anti-Nicene Fathers, Bk. IV, Ch. XVI, at 480.) He then explains the Sabbath must be kept on Saturday as a sign. This explains why the earliest Christian tradition followed Saturday Sabbath except at Rome and Alexandria. Socrates the Historian (b. 380 A.D.) wrote: "For although almost all Churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [the Lord's Supper] on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, refuse to do this."(Socrates, Ecclesiastical History, Bk 5, Ch. 22.289). Likewise Bingham summarizes numerous ancient sources: "The ancient Christians were very careful in the observation of Saturday, or the seventh day... It is plain that all the Oriental [Eastern] churches, and the greatest part of the world, observed the Sabbath as a festival... Athanasius likewise tells us that they held religious assemblies on the Sabbath, not because they were infected with Judaism, but to worship Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath, Epiphanius says the same." (Joseph Bingham, Antiquities of the Christian Church (1878) Vol. II, Bk. xx, Ch. 3, Sec. 1, 66. 1137,1136). 32. Sermon, Dr. Michael Haykin, Grace Fellowship Church, Toronto (January 24, 2004), reprinted at http://www.gfcto.com/articles/theology/nof3.htm (last visited 2005.) 33. The first use of the titlepontiff or pontifex summus for the bishop of Rome dates to the Sixth Century. This is recorded in Niermeyer's Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, citing the Leonine Sacramentary of the late sixth century. The term papa from which pope derives in English means father. It was used early on of any priest. It is impossible to say early on the title papa had the connotation we give it today. The notion of superiority of the bishop of Rome, justified on the successor-to-Peter principle, first was asserted in the late half of the second century. However, this attempt was "strongly criticized even by friends of Rome such as Irenaeus of Lyon." (B. Schimmelpfennig, The Papacy (New York: Columbia Press, 1992) at 12-14, viz, 12-13.) The papacy was not recognized until the Fourth Century but only in Roman territories.
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