“Let him be Anathema”: Not what many Protestants think it means

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

The Council of Trent, 4th December 1563 (23rd session).

I do hope this can be a very short, breathless break, since my thesis is picking up momentum and I don’t want to do anything to put on the brakes. But this is something that has come up frequently in my conversations with Protestants: Many Protestants misunderstand the idea of anathema, as in the formula used by the councils of Church in rejecting various doctrines — most particularly the canons of the Council of Trent in rejecting Protestant doctrines:

CANON IX. If any one shall say, that by faith alone the impious is justified; so as to mean that nothing else is required to co-operate in order unto obtaining the grace of justification, and that it is not in any respect necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema. (Council of Trent, Sixth Session [1547], Decree concerning Justification [trans. Theodore Alois Buckley])

(For the most piercing and enlightening commentary I’ve ever read on these pronouncements of Trent concerning justification and other doctrines, you should read my dear frend Laura, a former Protestant like myself who can sweep away Protestant questions and confusion like nobody else I know.)

The Magisterium of Church, assembled at the Council of Trent.

So anathema: To translate the word etymologically and literally, it can mean “accursed”; even “devoted to destruction.” Many Protestants understand that when the Council of Trent declared holders of these doctrines to be “anathema,” it was “devoting them to destruction” or even pronouncing “eternal damnation” on them — such that Protestants think that to “anathematize” someone is to “damn them to hell.” Naturally, Protestants are rather offended by this, and rightly hold that any Church that would pronounce eternal damnation on someone is not acting according to God’s will — which is that all men should be saved (1 Timothy 2:4).

But that’s not what the council was saying at all. Through generations of use, beginning even with the usage of St. Paul in the New Testament, anathema came to mean something other than its literal, etymological meaning — particularly in Latin, and particularly in the councils of the Church. Anathema sit (“Let him be anathema”) became a legal formula, something repeated by the councils to announce a particular, traditional judgment. When the councils pronounced holders of a doctrine anathema, it marked a formal excommunication from the Church: nothing more and nothing less.

Saint Paul (1637), by Jusepe de Ribera.

Excommunication, too, is often misunderstood; even though it is a biblical doctrine that many Protestants practice (I have heard them refer to it euphemistically as “disfellowship,” but the concept is the same): to remove one who is unrepentant in sin or incorrigibly teaching error from one’s church body, as St. Paul recommended in 1 Corinthians 5, even using language evocative of anathema (“deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh”, v. 5).

But the Catholic Church’s model of excommunication is just as St. Paul’s: it is not a pronouncement of eternal damnation, but a disciplinary measure designed to motivate the sinner to repentance and reconciliation. The full verse above reads, “Deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.” The goal of excommunication is not damnation, but salvation. It is the Church’s mission to love and lead the lost to salvation in Christ, not to hate or damn to hell (hello Westboro Baptist Church). Excommunication is tough love, the Holy Mother Church kicking her prodigal son out of the house until he gets his act together. And just as with the father of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32), it is the Church’s great joy to accept and embrace her lost son back as soon as he repents and seeks forgiveness (cf. 2 Corinthians 2:5–11).

El Greco, Portrait of Pope Pius V (c. 1605) (WikiPaintings.org)

“But… but… you’re making that up!” I’ve heard Protestants say. “You’re just trying to change the meaning to whitewash what the council did!” “Show me where it says that this is what it meant!” Well, simple logic dictates that the Church was not pronouncing a permanent, irrevocable damnation here: If that were so, then the Church would not have gone to such great effort to win back our separated Protestant brethren during the Counter-Reformation (notably through the efforts of the Jesuits) and ever since: If any holder of Protestant doctrines was irretrievably damned — if the Church wanted to damn him — then why bother? Many, many separated brothers, even whole countries, such as Poland and Lithuania, were brought back to the Catholic faith, and accepted with open and loving arms.

Also, for what it’s worth, the canons of the councils of the Catholic Church apply only to members of the Catholic Church: after one has formally separated from the Catholic Church and rejected its authority, then its disciplinary pronouncements have no more bearing on him. The declaration of anyone as “anathema” at the Council of Trent does not technically apply to Protestants today, only to Catholics who were espousing those doctrines. You can’t very well be excommunicated from something you were never formally a part of.

But here are a few sources explaining the meaning of anathema, not made up by me or anyone else:

ANATHEMA. A thing devoted or given over to evil, so that “anathema sit” means, “let him be accursed.” St. Paul at the end of 1 Corinthians pronounces this anathema on all who do not love our blessed Saviour. The Church has used the phrase “anathema sit” from the earliest times with reference to those whom she excludes from her communion either because of moral offences or because they persist in heresy. Thus one of the earliest councils — that of Elvira, held in 306 — decrees in its fifty-second canon that those who placed libellous writings in the church should be anathematised; and the First General Council anathematised those who held the Arian heresy. General councils since then have usually given solemnity to their decrees on articles of faith by appending an Anathema.

Neither St. Paul nor the Church of God ever wished a soul to be damned. In pronouncing anathema against wilful heretics, the Church does but declare that they are excluded from her communion, and that they must, if they continue obstinate, perish eternally. (W. E. Addis, & T. Arnold, A Catholic Dictionary. New York: Catholic Pub. Soc., 1887], 24)

And for a bit lengthier and more precise:

Anathema. — This may be a convenient place to explain the true meaning of the phrase, “Let him be Anathema,” with which these and so many other definitions of doctrine close. The word is of Greek origin, and exists in that language in two forms, distinguished by a very trifling difference of spelling, but very distinct in use. Both are derived from a verb meaning “to set aside,” and in one form (ἀνάθημα) the word is used of something precious, set aside for the service of God, such as the gifts with which the Temple in Jerusalem was adorned (St. Luke 21:5; see also 2 Maccabees 9:16). But the word occurs also in another form (ἀνάθεμα), and with this spelling it is employed to signify a penal setting aside, whether of a thing which has been used as the instrument of wickedness, or of a person who has lost his social rights by crime. It occurs in both senses, in a verse of Deuteronomy (7:26). St. Paul uses the word more than once, to signify that a person is not worthy to be admitted into the society of Christians (1 Corinthians 16:22; Galatians 1:8, 9).

In the language of the Church, the phrase, “Let him be Anathema,” is used in the same manner as by St. Paul, and is a form of assigning the penalty of excommunication for an offence; when used, as it often is, to enforce definitions of faith, it means no more than this; but sometimes an Anathema seems to mean an excommunication pronounced against an offender with solemn and impressive ceremonies, which, however, do not alter the nature of the punishment. As we remarked in the place cited from our first volume, no anathema or other act of a human judge can take away the grace of God from the soul, if by any error the judgment has been pronounced against an innocent man.

In one place (1 Cor. 16:22) St. Paul adds to the word Anathema “Maranatha;” and the same is sometimes done by Councils of particular Churches, but the usage has not passed into the general Canon Law. It has been supposed, but wrongly, that the addition of this word signifies that the censure will never be relaxed (Benedict XIV, De Synod. 10, i. 7). Maranatha is in truth an Aramaic word, belonging to a language familiar to St. Paul and most of his readers. It means “The Lord is at hand,” and has the same force as when this expression is used in its Greek form. (Philippians 4:5) The phrase enhances the force of that to which it it appended, by solemnly reminding the reader that Christ will come again, to judge the world. (S. J. Hunter, Outlines of Dogmatic Theology, 3rd ed., vol. 2 [New York: Benzinger Bros., 1896], 399–401)

And for a secular source, lest you think this is a Catholic conspiracy to change history:

anathema, (from Greek anatithenai: “to set up,” or “to dedicate”), in the Old Testament, a creature or object set apart for sacrificial offering. Its return to profane use was strictly banned, and such objects, destined for destruction, thus became effectively accursed as well as consecrated. Old Testament descriptions of religious wars call both the enemy and their besieged city anathema inasmuch as they were destined for destruction.

In New Testament usage a different meaning developed. St. Paul used the word anathema to signify a curse and the forced expulsion of one from the community of Christians. In A.D. 431 St. Cyril of Alexandria pronounced his 12 anathemas against the heretic Nestorius. In the 6th century anathema came to mean the severest form of excommunication that formally separated a heretic completely from the Christian church and condemned his doctrines; minor excommunications, while prohibiting free reception of the sacraments, obliged (and permitted) the sinner to rectify his sinful state through the sacrament of penance. (“Anathema,” in Encyclopedia Brittannica)

You’ll find much the same in any other scholarly source (barring the likes of Jack Chick and Loraine Boettner).

Once again, I fail, predictably, at brevity. I’d better get back to work. I do hope this will be helpful to some seeker.

St. Paul on prayers for the dead

Posted on April 28, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

The Apostle Paul, by Andrei Rublev (c. 1410)

The Apostle Paul (c. 1410), by Andrei Rublev. (WikiPaintings.org)

Okay, so the plan is to whip up a brief post here and there and maybe even queue up a few at a time. Can I do that? Can I be brief?

Waking up this morning [now a couple of days ago] the question nudged at me: What is the earliest evidence we have in the Church of prayers of living Christians for those Christian brothers and sisters who have passed over into death? So rolling out of bed, before I’d even had my coffee, in an uncaffeinated stupor, I set about to find out. That’s how you know it’s the Holy Spirit working — that same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead, quickening my mortal body to do good works, though the mind be absent.

In very little time, I was led to this verse (2 Timothy 1:16–18; credit be to Wikipedia):

May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me; he was not ashamed of my chains, but when he arrived in Rome he searched for me eagerly and found me — may the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that Day — and you well know all the service he rendered at Ephesus.

Onesiphorus, it should be clear, is dead. St. Paul speaks of him in the past (aorist) tense. He was not ashamed of Paul’s chains, a simple action in the past, not an ongoing one. Since Paul is still in chains (2 Timothy 2:9), and Onesiphorus’s not-being-ashamed is not ongoing, and he is not still refreshing Paul, it is evident that Onesiphorus is no longer living. Paul first asks God’s mercy for the household of Onesiphorus, not Onesiphorus himself. Regarding Onesiphorus, Paul prays that he find mercy from the Lord on that Day. On that Day (this is the capitalization shown in the RSVCE and ESV) has a very clear eschatological connotation: this is the last day, the Day of the Lord. Paul is asking for God’s mercy on Onesiphorus before the throne of Judgment.

Now, against Protestant objections: why would Paul ask for God’s mercy on someone before the Judgment Seat, when that person was still living? Whoever says, “May God have mercy on your soul — that is, when you die”? Onesiphorus is quite dead. And the fact that after his passing, Paul still prays for God’s mercy on him is a clear, scriptural indication that in the view of Paul, the Apostle, the inspired writer, such prayers for the dead are beneficial. As Scripture says elsewhere (and as Protestants conveniently reject), “it was a holy and pious thought [to make] atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.” (2 Maccabees 12:45, RSVCE)

A few words on the Blessed Virgin Mary as “Co-Redemptrix” or “Co-Mediatrix”

Posted on April 4, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

In some Catholic writings and documents of the Church, the Blessed Virgin Mary is referred to as a “co-redemptrix” or “co-mediatrix” in salvation through Christ. Those are words and concepts that many Protestants have a hard time with. Here are a few brief words I whipped up on that matter, in response to my new friend Eugene.

Madonna and Child, by Carlo Maratta (c. 1660).

The term “co-redeemer” does not imply that the Blessed Virgin Mary had a role in salvation in any way similar, equal, or comparable to that of Christ. No one in the Catholic Church intends to share with Mary anything that is rightly Christ’s — rather, we think Christ’s glory is so bright that it illuminates everything around Him, including his mother. Any honor we give to Mary is just a greater way to more greatly honor Him. Jesus loved His mother, and so we do, too. And she did cooperate in a profound way with God’s plan of salvation.

Now, you have to remember that many Catholics of the past were not speaking English — they were speaking Latin. And the Latin language has different rules and conventions than the English language. One major difference, as I mentioned before, is that the Latin brain likes to put prefixes on things. In many cases where an English speaker would use a preposition, a Latin speaker puts a prefix on a noun or verb. For example, the word “convene” comes from the Latin cum + venio, to “come together.” Rather than say “we come together” as an English speaker might, the Latin speaker would say convenimus. The word “cooperate” is another apropos example. It comes from the same prefix — cum + opero, to “work together.”

Virgin and Child with Rosary, 1655 (Murillo)

Virgin and Child with Rosary (1655), by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo.

In English we are used to the prefix “co-” meaning that people share in equal responsibilities in a job — “co-contributors,” “co-chairmen,” “co-instructors” are all people equally pitching into their jobs. But in Latin the prefix doesn’t imply that. It just means that people are doing the job “with” each other. To say that Mary cooperated (“worked together”) with salvation is quite a different proposition (in both English and Latin) than saying Mary “worked” salvation herself. Similarly to say that Mary is a “co-redemptrix,” as she is sometimes called in Latin, in no way implies that she is on the same level as Christ the Redeemer, is “another redeemer,” or shares in His glory or responsibility. There is only one Redeemer, and that is Christ. To call Mary a “co-redemptrix” only means that she “worked together” — she “cooperated” — with redemption. Remember, she herself had to be redeemed, too!

(Because of this linguistic confusion, it’s not very common for people to use the term “co-redeemer” or “co-redemptrix” in English these days. You will mainly find that in older writings, especially those that were translated directly from Latin. You will not find that term in the present Catechism or in any other recent teaching of the Church.)

Here is a recent teaching of the Church on this very question, from the Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution of the Church Lumen Gentium (§62) [which speaks at length about the Catholic Church’s beliefs about Mary and her role in salvation and relationship with the Church]:

This maternity of Mary in the order of grace began with the consent which she gave in faith at the Annunciation [that is, the “Announcement” by the angel Gabriel of Jesus’s coming] and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, and lasts until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this salvific duty, but by her constant intercession continued to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation. By her maternal charity, she cares for the brethren of her Son, who still journey on earth surrounded by dangers and cultics, until they are led into the happiness of their true home. Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked by the Church under the titles of Advocate, Auxiliatrix, Adjutrix, and Mediatrix. This, however, is to be so understood that it neither takes away from nor adds anything to the dignity and efficaciousness of Christ the one Mediator. For no creature could ever be counted as equal with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer. Just as the priesthood of Christ is shared in various ways both by the ministers and by the faithful, and as the one goodness of God is really communicated in different ways to His creatures, so also the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a sharing in this one source. The Church does not hesitate to profess this subordinate role of Mary. It knows it through unfailing experience of it and commends it to the hearts of the faithful, so that encouraged by this maternal help they may the more intimately adhere to the Mediator and Redeemer.

The Pope’s Holiness and Infallibility

Posted on March 23, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

I’m on a roll here! Three posts in as many days! In response to this post:

My Protestant friend asks:

So the pope’s word is supposed to be infallible, right? When does it become so? Was his word as a “cardinal” infallible? And since he’s still alive does his word continue to be infallible? If not, how does one go from being fallible to infallible and back to fallible again? Talk about a rollercoaster ride! And also, is Benedict still the most-holy or is he only normal-holy? Or is he even Benedict anymore?

Blessings and Prayers for our new Holy Father Pope Francis

Hi again. I appreciate that you are interested in asking questions and having a respectful dialogue. It doesn’t look like you’ve gotten any adequate answers here. I do hope you will consider me your “Catholic friend” and, I do hope, “brother.” I look forward to your response to my other comments on the authority of the papacy.

I’ll try to reply here in brief, and then we can expand if you wish.

Your question about infallibility again reflects some misunderstandings. I think you are misunderstanding the ways in which the Catholic Church sometimes uses the word holy. For the sake of discussion, let’s define that word. From TheFreeDictionary.com:

ho·ly [ˈhəʊlɪ]
adj. ho·li·er, ho·li·est
1. Belonging to, derived from, or associated with a divine power; sacred.
2. Regarded with or worthy of worship or veneration; revered: a holy book.
3. Living according to a strict or highly moral religious or spiritual system; saintly: a holy person.
4. Specified or set apart for a religious purpose: a holy place.
5. Solemnly undertaken; sacrosanct: a holy pledge.
6. Regarded as deserving special respect or reverence: The pursuit of peace is our holiest quest.
7. Informal Used as an intensive: raised holy hell over the mischief their children did.

When we call the pope the “Holy Father,” that is an aspect of his office — that office is (1) “belonging to, derived from, or associated with a divine power,” the Church, and his office is (4) “specified or set apart for a religious purpose”; that office is (5) “solemnly undertaken,” and because of that office, he is (6) “regarded as deserving special respect or reverence.” The pope, as a man, may or may not be holy as in (3), “living [a holy life],” being “a holy person.” Certainly there have been popes who were not!

To say that God is holy is an entirely different sense of the word. God alone is infinitely holy and (2) “worthy of worship”; He is also, by his nature, (1) “a divine power” and “sacred.” The saints (sancti, holy ones, those set apart), on the other hand, are holy first and foremost because they (3) lived holy lives, and we believe that after their deaths they’ve gone to Heaven and are with Jesus and are thus (1) associated with a divine power. They are (2) deserving of veneration, not akin to worship but more akin to (6), a special respect or reverence.

Prayers are blessings to our Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI.

Now, to your question about infallibility: Again, you are misunderstanding the Church’s claims. Infallibility is an aspect of the office of the papacy, not of the person of the pope. There was nothing “infallible” about Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger before he was pope, or about him now that he is no longer the sitting pope. And this is why I got into that about holiness: you ask how holy he is: well, he’s only as holy as the life he lives. Having read his writings and followed his life for the past eight years, I think he’s a pretty holy guy — but there’s nothing divine about him as a person, and never was. Further, there is nothing infallible about the person of Pope Francis, or the former Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio.

With regard to infallibility: the best way to think about it is not so much about the pope being infallible, but that when he sits in the captain’s chair, it’s really God steering the boat. Literally, that’s pretty much exactly what the Church teaches: by the formal definition of the doctrine, the pope is only said to be infallible when he speaks ex cathedra (“from the chair” of the episcopate) regarding matters of faith and morals (and “the chair” is not a literal chair). Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would guide the Church into all truth (John 16:13), and it’s only as an aspect of that that the pope is ever considered infallible. And his infallibility only “kicks in” when he invokes it; and it is only formally invoked in very limited circumstances. The pope in his day-to-day life isn’t infallible when he declares his favorite pizza or gives his opinion about football (soccer, you know), or even when he writes encyclicals about Church practice or discipline (which are not considered ex cathedra, but, by analogy, written standing up). He is considered to have authority when he writes such, just as a prominent pastor or scholar is considered to have authority when he speaks, by nature of who he is and what he knows. But papal infallibility has only really been invoked a few times in the past couple of centuries. And ex cathedra pronouncements are only ever made in union and agreement with the cardinals and bishops of the Church.

May Blessed Pope John Paul II, of happy memory, pray for us.

It all boils down to this: Papal infallibility is an assurance that the Holy Spirit, not the pope, is guiding the Church, when push comes to shove. That is not to say that the pope is the Holy Spirit, or always follows the Holy Spirit, or even necessarily lives in accord with the Holy Spirit — certainly there have been popes who have not. But even in the darkest times of the Church, corrupt popes have never promulgated doctrine that is contradictory to the teachings of Christ or the Bible or the Church: they have never declared, say, that the pope is divine, or that Mary is divine, or that Jesus is anything but divine. They have never declared that adultery or theft or murder is okay, or that everybody has to give all their money to the Church. The fact that even the most dastardly people who have held the office of pope, regardless of how they lived their personal lives, have never promulgated such heresy or error should be a confirmation of the truth of this doctrine. Infallibility — the guidance of the Holy Spirit — ensures that the Church will never run off the rails. And the fact that in 2,000 years it hasn’t is a sign of the Church’s Oneness, Holiness, Apostolicity, and Catholicity. You and I disagree about interpretations of Scripture — you may even disagree that the Church has never “run off the rails.” But in the 2,000 years of the recorded history of the Catholic Church, the Church has never promulgated any doctrine in opposition or contradiction to its own doctrines, or contradictory to the truth of Scripture. You would be hard pressed to prove that it has.

As an extension to the doctrine of infallibility: the Magisterium of the Church (Magisterium means “teachership” — the teaching authority of the Church) — that is, the collected body of bishops in communion with the pope, the chief bishop — is considered infallible in its agreement. This means that the ecumenical councils of the Church, from Nicaea to Vatican II, have taught infallible doctrine.

There you have an explanation of the Church’s teachings on infallibility. I will let you chew that up before I continue with the Marian doctrines.

A Biblical Argument for the Authority of the Papacy

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

El Greco, The Repentant Peter (c. 1600). (WikiPaintings.org)

Wowzers, you get two posts by me in just two days! I couldn’t help myself. I wrote this piece in response to another post, and come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever posted this argument here before.

The title “pope,” to which you objected on the grounds that it can’t be found in Scripture, is only an honorific one; “papa” in Latin is an affectionate term along the lines of “daddy.” The office is another matter. The “pope” is more formally the bishop of Rome, and the office of bishop (ἐπίσκοπος [episkopos]; episcopus in Latin, literally an “overseer”) is quite scriptural (1 Timothy 3, Philippians 1:1, Acts 20:28).

The Catholic Church does not claim, as you suppose, that the successor of Peter is the “earthly head” of the Church: as you say, there is only one Head, and that is Christ. Cf. the Catechism:

“Christ is the Head of this Body”

792. Christ “is the head of the body, the Church.” He is the principle of creation and redemption. Raised to the Father’s glory, “in everything he [is] preeminent,” especially in the Church, through whom he extends his reign over all things.

807. The Church is this Body of which Christ is the head: she lives from him, in him, and for him; he lives with her and in her.

The office of Peter and his successors is merely as the Church’s pastor, its shepherd, the vicar (stand-in, substitute, or representative — not replacement) of Christ:

936. The Lord made St. Peter the visible foundation of his Church. He entrusted the keys of the Church to him. The bishop of the Church of Rome, successor to St. Peter, is “head of the college of bishops, the Vicar of Christ and Pastor of the universal Church on earth” (CIC, can. 331).

St. Gregory the Great, by Francisco Goya (1797).

Surely you don’t object to pastors, called by God to be the shepherds of their churches? Just as God never left His people Israel without His authoritative voice — through prophets, priests, and kings — Jesus will never leave His people the Church without an authoritative shepherd. And Scripture affirms that He did not.

I think an honest reading of Scripture requires one to acknowledge that Jesus did delegate His authority, first to the Twelve Apostles as a group and then to Peter in particular. The references I could cite are numerous, but I will give you just a few of the most prominent and explicit:

Matthew 10:1: And He called to Him His twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction.
Matthew 10:5–8: These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay.” v. 40: “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me.”
- By Jesus’s own words, His gave authority to His disciples, and they received something from Him: the authority to carry out their ministry in His name. He sends them out as His representatives: “Whoever receives you receives me.”

El Greco, Portrait of Pope Pius V (c. 1605) (WikiPaintings.org)

Matthew 18:18, to the Twelve, in the context of dealing out church discipline: “Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
- Binding and loosing are rabbinical terms and concepts, which, according to the Jewish Encyclopedia, mean “to forbid and permit” authoritatively with regard to doctrinal and disciplinary pronouncements, such that “they [those with this authority; in the context of the article, the Pharisees] possessed and exercised the power of tying or untying a thing by the spell [i.e. word or formula] of their divine authority, just as they could, by the power vested in them, pronounce and revoke an anathema upon a person.” “This power and authority, vested in the rabbinical body of each age or in the Sanhedrin, received its ratification and final sanction from the celestial court of justice.” I don’t know how you read this, but it sounds very clear to me, first that this authority was Jesus’s to invest in whom He chose (surely the Pharisees would have considered this a gross blasphemy), and second that He invested that authority in His Apostles.
Matthew 16:17–19, to Peter solely (using singular pronouns and verbs), after Peter confessed Jesus as the Christ: And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
- Protestants like to reject the “upon this rock” statement with an argument involving the supposed difference between πέτρος and πέτρα in the Greek — but this argument does not hold any weight in Greek, as even most knowledgable Protestant scholars of Greek admit. Jesus’s wordplay between Peter’s name, explicitly stated, “You are Peter (Rock),” and the “rock” upon which Jesus said He would found His Church, mirrors grammatically Peter’s statement: “You are the Christ.”
  
  What is more, that argument does not deal with the other, equally important parts of Jesus’s pronouncement. Jesus gives three separate blessings to Peter and Peter alone which cannot be interpreted in any way but as an explicit investment of authority:
  
  Pope St. Leo the Great, by Francisco de Herrera the Younger (1622-1685).
  1. You (Peter) are “Rock,” and on this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
  2. I will give you (Peter) the keys of the kingdom of heaven [mirroring “the gates of hell”].
  3. Whatever you (Peter) bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven [linked implicitly to the “keys”].
  The fact that each is clearly directed to Peter negates the argument of some that the “rock” of the statement was only Peter’s faith or his confession.
Isaiah 22:20–22, the passage which Jesus was clearly referencing in His speech to Peter, as acknowledged even by Protestant exegetes (cf. ESV Study Bible): [To Shebna, steward of the royal palace:] “In that day I will call my servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and I will clothe him with your robe, and will bind your sash on him, and will commit your authority to his hand. And he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. And I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David. He shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.”
- This passage describes a stripping of authority from one to whom it had been entrusted and an investment of that authority in someone new. In the context of the passage in Matthew and its application to Peter, the authority of binding and loosing with divine approval (“opening” and “shutting” the gates of the kingdom of heaven, with the key), which had been entrusted to the Jewish rabbinical body and the Sanhedrin, was now being removed and entrusted to Peter and the Apostles in Christ’s new order — from the rabbinical, teaching authority of the Jewish people to the episcopal, teaching authority of the Church, the Magisterium. Peter is installed as steward over the house of Judah, to exercise order over the household [the Church] in the absence of the king [Christ]. Christ certainly foreshadowed this stewardship in His parables about wise and foolish stewards or servants and their care for the affairs of the house while their master is away (Luke 12:35–48, Matthew 24:45–51). And what is more: he shall be called a father to the house of Judah: just as the bishop of Rome is called a Father to the Church: he is called the pope (papa), or the Holy Father. Given this understanding, the kissing of a ring — a very ancient sign of respect and acknowledgement of authority, not of worship — begins to make a bit more sense.
John 20:21–23, Jesus appearing to the Apostles after His Resurrection: Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”

Our Holy Father Pope Francis
- Just as the Father sent [Jesus], Jesus sends the Apostles in continuation of His ministry and authority, “to make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:18–20) and continue doing what He was doing. Just as Jesus has the authority to forgive sins (Mark 2:10–12) — an authority with a clear association to physical healing (cf. James 5:13–16) — He imparts that authority to the Apostles — with an implicit connection to that of “binding and loosing,” but rightly exceeding any authority before claimed by any other rabbi.

Evidently, we Catholics interpret Scripture more literally and realistically than you, and accept it more readily for what it actually says in its plainest sense. I don’t think that leaves you much ground to stand on from which to accuse the Catholic Church of “unbiblical practices.”

Some Answers to Common Protestant Objections to Peter’s Ministry as Bishop of Rome

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Joseph T. Richardson

Peter Paul Rubens. St. Peter. c. 1611. Oil on canvas.

Hi. I am sorry that I’ve been such an absentee tenant lately, but I’ve been swamped in the mud bog of my thesis. Today has been a new day of positive meetings with my professors and friends, so I hope and pray I can put some step back into it.

I am thrilled by the election of Pope Francis to the See of Peter, and already love him dearly. Even many Protestants have been caught up in the worldwide excitement that he has elicited (SatelliteSaint has some thoughtful words on “that feeling”) — for both better and worse. While many, with the rest of Christendom, have been filled with great joy and fascination, others, as if to actively reject and deny that joy, have seized the opportunity to lash out in scorn and prejudice and carve even deeper the sad divisions in the Body of Christ.

Consequently, I have been having some random apologetic discussions here and there, and today I wrote a brief response (inspired by this post) to some common objections I’ve often heard from Protestants with regard to the Apostle Peter’s ministry in Rome as its first bishop — the foundations of the papacy. Since I’ve already written it, and thought it a direct and concise argument, I thought I’d share it with you.

Saints Peter and Paul (between 1605 and 1608), by El Greco.

Scripture clearly states that Christ called Peter to be the Apostle to the Jews, and Paul to be the Apostle to the Gentiles (Galatians 2:7–9, 2 Timothy 1:11, Romans 15:16–18). Therefore Peter would never have become bishop of Rome, a city of Gentiles.

Peter’s primary calling was to the Jews, just as Paul’s primary calling was to the Gentiles. But Peter’s ministry was not limited or restricted to the Jews, any more than Paul’s was restricted to the Gentiles: In fact Paul preached to Jews everywhere he went; his first stop was always the local synagogue (Acts 13, 14, 17, 18, etc.). Peter likewise ministered to the Gentiles: in fact it was to Peter, not Paul, that Christ gave the definitive vision that salvation was for the Gentiles as well as the Jews, and Peter is responsible for the first prominent Gentile converts in the family of Cornelius (Acts 10). To quote Peter himself at the Council of Jerusalem:

Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. (Acts 15:7)

This is not even to mention that there was a large and prominent population of Jews in Rome which Peter pastored: as many as the first ten popes are believed to have been Jewish Christians.

Apostle St. Paul (c. 1612), by El Greco.

Paul, in his letter to the Romans, writes of “imparting a spiritual gift” to the Roman Christians, that they may “be established” (Romans 1:11); so the Church at Rome was not established at the time of Paul’s writing and could not have been founded by Peter.

Nobody claims that Peter or Paul are responsible for the first Christian converts in Rome; Paul’s letter very well indicates that there was already a Christian community there. Also, nobody claims that Peter single-handedly founded the Roman Church: the Church teaches that the early ministries of both Peter and Paul, through Christ, laid the foundations of the Church, the pillars upon which the Church was built. By analogy, George Washington didn’t “found” the U.S., but he was nonetheless its first president and is called a “Founding Father,” even though many men had worked for the cause of revolution and independence before him. Likewise Peter and Paul are the “Founding Fathers” of the Roman Church.

Paul never mentions in any of his letters that Peter was in Rome, especially not in Romans 16 when he offers greetings to the people of the Church there, or in the accounts of Paul’s arrest, trial, and imprisonment in Rome (Acts 28). Therefore Peter was not there in Rome.

He wasn’t there yet. Paul likewise hadn’t set up permanent residence in Rome yet, but we know that Peter and Paul ministered there at the same time and both died there. Tradition holds that Peter ministered in Antioch (where he was also the first bishop) before coming to Rome, and together with Paul, in Corinth. All of this would have taken place after the Epistle to the Romans, the Acts of the Apostles, and many other New Testament documents, were written.

At the end of Paul’s life, in his final letter, Paul states that “only Luke is with me” in his final imprisonment in Rome (2 Timothy 4:11) — therefore Peter was not there.

Paul’s statement that “only Luke is with me” is not a statement that there were no other Christians in Rome — in fact there was a thriving Christian community by that time, or else there wouldn’t have been a letter to them. Certainly he meant “only Luke is with me” by his side, in prison, or in his house arrest.

The Crucifixion of Peter, by Caravaggio

Paul’s statement also that at his trial “all deserted me” (2 Timothy 4:16) likewise does not entail that “all” of the Church, or Peter specifically, deserted him, or were not in Rome at all. Certainly there was a substantial Church at Rome, as history records the first bloody persecutions of a great number of Christians under Nero around that time, during which both Paul and Peter met their martyrdom. In the context of this statement, Paul is clearly not referring to his desertion by the leaders of the Church, but by men of high rank or influence with whom he’d become acquainted whose testimony might have made a difference in his trial.

In fact, Peter himself tells us that he was in Rome:

She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son. (1 Peter 5:13)

Certainly Peter was not literally writing from the ancient “Babylon,” which had lain in ruins for centuries, but from the modern Babylon, the great whore that John describes in the Revelation — Rome itself.

You don’t have to take my word for it. Here is the interpretation of the editors of the well-respected Protestant ESV Study Bible:

1 Pet. 5:13 She who is at Babylon, who is chosen almost certainly refers to the church in Rome, not a literal woman (cf. “elect lady,” 2 John 1, 13). Although the Babylon of the OT was in ruins, the reference resonates with the OT, where “Babylon” represents a center of earthly power opposed to God (cf. Isaiah 13:14; Jeremiah 50:51; see also Revelation 17:18), and in Peter’s day that city would be Rome. The language of “Babylon” and “chosen” forms an inclusio (a literary envelope) with the first verse of the book: the OT background to “Babylon” reminds believers that though they are exiles, they are “elect exiles” (1 Pet. 1:1) who will receive the promised inheritance. Mark is the same John Mark who traveled with Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey (cf. Acts 12:25; 13:5, 13; 15:36:39). Though he left Paul and Barnabas, he was later restored to his former usefulness (Col. 4:10; 2 Tim. 4:11; Philem. 24). Peter would have known Mark from the earliest days, because the church met in his mother’s home (Acts 12:12). In addition, this verse shows a close relationship between Peter and Mark (my son) and is one indication of the validity of the early church tradition that Mark wrote his Gospel at Peter’s direction.

These are only a few of the common Protestant objections to the claim of Peter’s ministry in Rome; but the facts speak for themselves, through incontrovertible biblical, historical and patristic, and archaeological evidence. The See of Peter can only be denied by denying these truths on their face.

Some light on the Perpetual Virginity of Mary

Posted on December 25, 2012 by Joseph T. Richardson

Rembrandt, Adoration of the Shepherds (1646)

Adoration of the Shepherds (1646), by Rembrandt. (WikiPaintings.org)

It being Christmas, the celebration of Nativity of the Lord, it seems appropriate that I make this post that has been on my mind for a week or two, regarding the Perpetual Virginity of Mary.

The Perpetual Virginity of Mary is one of those Marian dogmata that over much of my conversion, I affirmed more out of loyalty to the Church than out of credulity. I accepted that the Catholic Church was the true Church of Christ and the bearer of Apostolic Tradition, and therefore I would abide by her teachings. But being a lifelong Protestant, I didn’t believe that really, did I? It was one of the two doctrines I struggled with most (the other being Mary as Παναγία [Panhagia] or All-Holy), because there simply was no biblical support for it at all. In fact, Scripture says the opposite: Jesus had brothers and sisters (Mark 6:3, Matthew 13:55–56). This doctrine seemed to me to be a demonization of human sexuality, equating sex with sin and undermining the Church’s teaching on the family: the Holy Family was not a functioning, conjugal, procreative family at all, but one consisting of Mary Ever-Virgin, All-Holy; Joseph, her “most chaste spouse”; and the Christ Child, who was God Himself. The perpetual virginity smacked of the kind of argument one would expect from an admiring child: “My Mother never did that!”

It was reading Fr. Luigi Gambero’s Mary and the Fathers of the Church that opened my eyes: Belief in the perpetual virginity has been a part of the Christian faith since the very beginning. It does not undermine teachings on the family, but affirms the Full Humanity and Full Divinity of Christ. It does not equate sex with sin, but holds forth Mary’s womb as the sacred sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, the Ark of the New Covenant, that it must have been to contain God Himself. The Protoevangelium of James, an early apocryphal gospel, can be dated to around A.D. 120, and though certainly not historical, it testifies clearly to a firm belief in Mary’s perpetual virginity at that early date; in fact, supporting it seems the text’s principal aim. Though pseudepigraphical, claiming as its author James the Just, the “brother of the Lord,” the text was written within living memory of Mary. Origen, writing early in the third century, rejected the text, but nonetheless concurred with its author in affirming Mary’s perpetual virginity (Origen, Comm. Matt. 10.17). And indeed Mary’s perpetual virginity was affirmed by Fathers of the Church from then on; questioned and at times challenged, but always defended and maintained.*

* I don’t have the Gambero book with me at the moment, or I would give you some quotations; it’s still in a box somewhere lost among a mountain of other boxes. But it is chocked full of patristic quotations on every aspect of Marian doctrine, if anyone should be interested.

Over the year or two I’ve been becoming Catholic, though, I have realized that there is scriptural support for Mary’s perpetual virginity. I found another strong indication just last week, and wanted to rush here immediately to share it.

Virgin Mary (c. 1600), by El Greco. (WikiPaintings.org)

Behold, Your Mother

First of all, and most prominently: Jesus on the Cross, in the Gospel of John, gives his mother into the care of John (John 19:26–27):

When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home.

It would make little sense for Jesus to place his mother in John’s care if she had other children living — and, according to the Protestant argument, she certainly did: at the very least James, “brother of the Lord,” and Jude, who both wrote New Testament epistles. Therefore it seems that James and Jude and the other “brethren” of the Lord were not “brothers” in the full and literal sense, but rather in the sense of “kinsmen.” This is not a new argument; the Fathers discovered it ages ago, as Gambero illustrates.

Maria (c. 1648), by Alonzo Cano. (WikiPaintings.org)

Apostles and Brothers of the Lord

More and more lately, as I dig deeper into the New Testament, I’ve been becoming aware of another argument that undoubtedly supports the argument the “brethren” of the Lord were not full and literal “brothers.” I explored it to some degree in my post on the Apostles named James. At the time, I considered the conclusion somewhat fanciful and poorly supported — but you know, one instance of this in Scripture might have been a case of poor wording; but two or three, and the idea gains some weight.

St. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, examines the “rights” of the Apostles (1 Corinthians 9:5):

Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?

Duccio, Appearance of Christ to the Apostles (1311)

Appearance of Christ to the Apostles (fragment) (1311), by Duccio. (WikiPaintings.org)

In increasing order of importance, Paul lists: (1) the other Apostles, (2) the brothers of the Lord, and (3) Cephas, or Peter, the chief Apostle. Together, this statement seems to refer to the Twelve, and includes “the brothers of the Lord” among them — brothers plural, implying at least two “brothers of the Lord” were among the number of the Apostles.

Protestants, of course, argue that Paul is using the word “apostle” in a broader sense than in reference to the Twelve — after all, Paul himself was an “apostle” and not one of the Twelve. An “apostle” (ἀπόστολος) is literally anyone who has been sent. But in an analysis of the Greek New Testament, it seems that it is rarely used in this broad sense*, but that the term is a specific and technical term referring to an office of the Church, and applied almost exclusively to the Twelve and to Paul.

* See analysis below.

Which brings me to my discovery last week: In Galatians, perhaps the earliest of Paul’s letters, we have one of the most unambiguous examples of the word apostle. Following Paul’s conversion, he did not immediately go to Jerusalem to consult with “those who were Apostles before me” (Galatians 1:17). But then (Galatians 1:18–19):

Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother.

Immediately I was struck. I was impressed by the example above in 1 Corinthians, though it was rather unspecific; but here we have it clear and unambiguous: James, the “brother” of the Lord, was an Apostle — and not just an “apostle,” meaning a messenger or someone who was sent, but one who was an Apostle before Paul — one of the Twelve.

Duccio, The Apostle James Alphaeus (1311)

The Apostle James Alphaeus (1311), by Duccio. (WikiPaintings.org)

But how is this possible? We know the names of the Twelve Apostles, and none of them are identified as brothers of the Lord (Matthew 10:1–3, Mark 3:13–18, Luke 6:12–16, Acts 1:12–14). But there are two Apostles named James — James, called the Greater, the son of Zebedee; and James, called the Less, the son of Alphaeus. James the Greater was certainly dead by the time Paul met with the other Apostles in Jerusalem (Acts 12:1–3). So if the James whom Paul met was one of the Twelve, then it follows that James, the “brother” of the Lord, is in fact James the Less, the son of Alphaeus.

But how, then, can he be a “brother” of the Lord? Well, as I demonstrate in the other post focusing more intently on this problem, neither the Hebrew language nor the Aramaic language which Jesus spoke had a word for “cousin” — which it seems this James may have been (see the post). The word ἀδελφός in Greek, too, could carry the connotation of “kinsman” or any relative. Though the Scripture says “not even his brothers believed in Him” (John 7:5), it does not say that none of His brothers (i.e. kinsmen) believed in Him. James the Less may have been one of the less ardent and conspicuous Apostles during Jesus’s earthly life and ministry, but as a cousin Jesus would have called him “brother,” in an even closer sense than he called all the Apostles “brothers” (e.g. John 20:17) — an epithet he carried with him for the rest of his life. Following his witness of Jesus’s Resurrection, it seems that James the Less — James the Just — stepped up to his calling and served the Lord with his life.

A merry and blessed Christmas to all of you, dear brothers and sisters.

* Appendix: An Analysis of the Word “Apostle” (ἀπόστολος) in the Greek New Testament

Matthew: 1 use, Matthew 10:2, in enumerating the Twelve Apostles

Mark: 2 uses, Mark 3:14, 6:30, in enumerating and referring to the Twelve

Luke: 5 uses, five times referring explicitly to the Twelve, Luke 6:13, 9:10, 17:5, 22:14, 24:10, one time in Jesus saying that God would send “prophets and apostles” (Luke 11:49) — connecting the ministry of the Apostles to the ministry of prophets

Acts: 28 uses, the first 18 cases referring unambiguously to the Twelve (Acts 1:2, 1:26, 2:37, 2:42, 2:43, 4:33, 4:35, 4:36, 4:37, 5:2, 5:12, 5:18, 5:29, 5:40, 6:6, 8:1, 8:14, 8:18 ); 8 times referring to the “apostles and elders” at Jerusalem or in Judea, most likely referring to the Twelve (Acts 9:27, 11:1, 15:2, 15:4, 15:6, 15:22, 15:23, 16:4); twice referring to Paul and Barnabas (14:4, 14:14)

Romans: 3 uses, twice of Paul referring to himself as an Apostle (Romans 1:13, 11:13); once referring to “the apostles,” most likely the Twelve (16:7)

1 Corinthians: 9 uses, three times Paul referring to himself (1 Corinthians 1:1, 9:1, 9:2), the latter two cases in the context of the other apostles, and admitting some would not consider him an apostle (9:2); once, the verse above, referring to the apostles as an undefined body, but including himself and apparently Barnabas among their number (9:5, cf. 9:6); three times referring to apostles as a body or apostleship as a ministry of the Church (4:9, 12:28, 12:29); twice in unambiguous reference to the Twelve (15:7, 15:9)

2 Corinthians: 6 uses, once Paul referring to himself (2 Corinthians 1:1); once referring to ἀδελφοὶ ἡμῶν, ἀπόστολοι ἐκκλησιῶν (“our brothers, apostles of the churches”), who are “the glory of Christ,” most likely referring to the Twelve, but commonly translated in Protestant Bibles as “messengers,” in the tradition of the King James Version (8:23); three times referring to “super-apostles” or “false apostles” (11:13, 12:11, 12:12)

Galatians: 3 uses, once Paul referring to himself (Galatians 1:1); twice referring unambiguously to the Twelve (1:17, 1:19)

Ephesians: 4 uses, once Paul referring to himself (Ephesians 1:1); three times referring to “apostles” as a body and ministry among other ministries of the Church (prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers) (2:20, 3:5, 4:11)

Philippians: 1 use, Philippians 2:25, referring to Epaphroditus as “messenger” to the faithful at Philippi

Colossians: 1 use, Paul referring to himself (Colossians 1:1)

1 Thessalonians: 1 use, Paul referring to “we” who had ministered at Thessalonica (1 Thessalonians 2:6)

1 Timothy: 2 uses, both times Paul referring to himself (1 Timothy 1:1, 2:7)

2 Timothy: 2 uses, both times Paul referring to himself (2 Timothy 1:1, 11:1

Titus: 1 use, Paul referring to himself (Titus 1:1)

1 Peter: 1 use, Peter referring to himself (1 Peter 1:1)

2 Peter: 2 uses, once Peter referring to himself (2 Peter 1:1); once referring to an unspecified body of “your apostles,” possibly referring to the Twelve (3:2)

Jude: 1 use, referring to “the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ,” probably referring to the Twelve (Jude 17

Revelation: 3 uses, once referring to false apostles (Revelation 2:2); once referring to “saints and apostles and prophets” (18:20); once unambiguously referring to “the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb” (21:14)

In conclusion, though the word ἀπόστολος can have a general usage as “messenger” in Greek, in the New Testament it is rarely used in that sense (once or at the most twice out of 81 uses). Rather “apostle” is a specific and technical term referring to an elite office and ministry of the Church, holding more authority than elders (πρεσβύτεροι or presbyteroi) — who in time became priests as we know them. When any “apostles” are identified, it seems that the term is applied exclusively to the Twelve, to Paul, and twice to Barnabas.

A Dialogue with a Rigorous Skeptic

Posted on December 24, 2012 by Joseph T. Richardson

Pentecost (1310), by Giotto. (WikiPaintings.org)

I have really struggled with how to present this piece, the wrapping up, for now, of my address toward the “rigorous skeptic.” This is my third rewrite. The first, the end of what I originally wrote the first night, seemed to stray from the point and lose coherence when I read it in the morning. The second addressed the roots of “rigorous skepticism” and sounded rather too preachy. Here I’m going to drop any pretense and be as frank as I can.

The fact is, every thinking person has a Rigorous Skeptic who lives inside. Just because one has faith in realities one cannot see and cannot objectively prove doesn’t mean one has abandoned all reason. But one must be careful that Skepticism is not merely Agnosticism in disguise. Questioning and testing every truth is healthy and beneficial. Resigning oneself to the conclusion that truth is unknowable precludes any possibility of faith or belief; it is in effect a refusal to believe. Faith is a gift from God; but one can’t receive that gift if one closes one’s mind and bars the door.

Here I’m going to bare the inner workings of my mind and let my own Rigorous Skeptic express himself for a little while. I’ll present it as a dialogue: a sample of the dialogue that goes on in my head every day of my life. I’ll have to restrain him for now, or else this post would be interminable. But this I offer as evidence that one can believe and still be a Rigorous Skeptic, as long as one is open to the possibilities of faith.

St. Paul (c. 1619), by Diego Velazquez. (WikiPaintings.org)

Acceptor: I believe because of the witness of the New Testament: The extant documents that we have — the Pauline epistles that are universally accepted as genuine, dateable to within two or three decades of the lifetime of Jesus, and the Gospels, which are dateable to no more than four or five. These give witness to the very early belief in Jesus as the risen Messiah, too early for such beliefs to have formed by a process of accretion and of the veneration of a mere man getting out of hand.

Detractor: Unless they were deliberately fabricated.

Acceptor: To what end? What would be in such deception for anyone to gain? Surely there was no monetary gain in misleading Jesus’s earliest followers, or popular or political power — only persecution and death.

Detractor: The followers of Jesus needed him to be their Messiah, to save the Jews and overthrow their Roman oppressors.

Acceptor: Then why not present him as such? The Gospels do not present Jesus as a political or military revolutionary. Jesus had failed to be the Messiah the Jews were looking for: the Jews rejected him, and gave him over to be crucified.

Detractor: At least according to the Gospels. They present that it was the Roman authorities who crucified him: Doesn’t it make more sense for them to have executed him as a troublemaker and rabblerouser, who threatened to incite an uprising?

Acceptor: But the historical fact remains that the Jews did not accept him. And even if many had, they abandoned his cause in dejection when he died.

Detractor: Thus the resurrection. His closest followers “resurrected” him in order to continue what Jesus started.

Hans Memling, Christ Giving His Blessing (1481)

Christ Giving His Blessing (1481), by Hans Memling.

Acceptor: Again: Why not present him as a political revolutionary, were that the case? Not even the Gospel of Mark, dated to ca. A.D. 70 if not earlier (the date of 70 hinges only on the argument that Jesus could not have foretold the destruction of the Jewish Temple in 70 [Mark 13:2]), presents Jesus as that kind of leader. In fact, there is not even a trace of that. He is presented, even from that early date, as a religious teacher and a “suffering Messiah” with clear deific claims, with the seeds of Christian theology firmly planted and evident. The Gospels present him as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy.

Detractor: Perhaps, then, the motive was to overthrow the ruling religious elites, the Pharisees and Sadducees and “teachers of the Law.” And as for prophecy: Clearly the authors of the Gospels shaped the “facts” of Jesus’s life in order to appear to fulfill the prophecies.

Acceptor: Jesus failed to be a religious revolutionary also, at least in the near sense of overthrowing the Jewish religious elites. The Jews on the large had rejected Jesus. It would have been of no profit to the earliest Christians to present a risen Messiah if they did not in fact believe him risen; to offer a savior from Roman oppressors who had already crushed the Jews (if in fact the date of 70 for Mark is correct) or to subvert a Judaic temple system that had already fallen. The earliest Christians believed that the risen Christ offered a different kind of salvation, one that extended beyond the Jews (e.g. Mark 6:26–29, 13:10,27).

St. Luke (c. 1625), by Frans Hals. (WikiPaintings.org)

And as for prophecy: The authors of the Gospels must have been brilliant men to have fabricated such an elaborate and thoroughgoing “fulfillment” of the Old Testament: to present a foretold Messiah who not only quoted the Old Testament Scriptures but lived them; who fulfilled not just a handful or even a dozen prophecies, but hundreds of Scriptures that had not even been traditionally viewed as Messianic prophecy — and not in a forced and clumsy fashion, but in beautiful symmetry from the deepest marrow of the Judaic religion to the trappings of the Jewish monarchy — in a way that satisfied both but subverted neither. If fabricated, it is a masterwork of fiction, written not by single mastermind, but harmonized through the writings of half a dozen different authors — all of whom were engaged in active and deliberate deception, and nearly all of whom went to martyrs’ deaths for that deception, with no evidence that any of them recanted.

Detractor: Perhaps it was not the earliest Christians who constructed such a fabrication, but later editors who altered the primary sources of the New Testament to create this “harmonized” image.

Acceptor: But there is no evidence that this is the case. The manuscript tradition of the New Testament, with papyri dating possibly to the first century and to mere decades after the authorship of the documents, shows no evidence of extensive tampering or emendation. The thousands of textual variants throughout the manuscripts do not call into question a single, major, doctrinal or christological claim of the Christian religion. It appears that we have texts that are reasonably close to the autographs of each New Testament book, and that these texts are substantially unchanged from what existed at the end of the first century.

Detractor: But the canon of the New Testament — certainly what we have is only the documents that later “orthodox” Christians found supported their position.

Papyrus 46, one of the oldest extant New Testament manuscripts, dated to ca. 175-225, and containing most of the Pauline epistles. (Wikipedia)

Detractor: But there is little evidence of other early documents that were rejected, either in manuscripts or in quotations in early patristic authors, or any others that were suppressed, as this thesis argues. The earliest extant authors beyond the New Testament, such as Clement of Rome (ca. 97), Ignatius of Antioch (ca. 108), Irenaeus of Lyon (ca. 180), to name a few, express full agreement with what became the established New Testament, quoting from the now-canonical documents extensively, with little evidence or mention of other documents that have been lost or suppressed — only a few, surviving quotations from which support the same canonical unity. There was a general consensus regarding the authority of most of the now-canonical New Testament documents by the middle of the second century (see the Muratorian fragment, ca. 170). The early patristic authors, especially Clement and Ignatius, describe a Christian Church with remarkable unity both in doctrine and polity among many groups of Christians. Clement, a leader in the Church at Rome, wrote to advise and admonish the Church at Corinth. Ignatius wrote letters in exhortation to churches across Syria and Asia Minor and even to Rome. Irenaeus wrote to reject the arguments of Gnostic religions, invoking as authority the same unity and agreement that existed among “orthodox” churches that can be seen in the earlier writers. These documents present a Church firmly structured and organized by orders of bishops and priests and deacons, attested in the New Testament and plainly established in the time of these early extrabiblical writers.

Detractor: That appears, admittedly, to be a strong case for the historical adequacy of the Church’s claims. I have nothing more — for now.

The Authority and Reliability of Paul: More historical thoughts on Early Christianity

Posted on December 21, 2012 by Joseph T. Richardson

Saint Paul (1637), by Jusepe de Ribera.

[Continuing my thoughts from last night, about the historical reliability of early Christian testimonies, in particular the biblical texts, and the argument that the “orthodoxy” we see today only stemmed from this faction being the victor among many competing early sects. This is Part 2, and it nearly doubled in size from what I started with tonight.]

My friend challenges that the New Testament texts themselves reveal fault lines and factions within early Christianity. Does this argument have merit?

It is true that Paul describes his conflicts with the Judaizers, early Christians who insisted that Jewish Christians should continue to observe the Mosaic Law, in effect, according to Paul, nullifying Christ’s atoning sacrifice by the argument that salvation was only possible through the works of the Law. (See especially Galatians and Romans.) 1 John 4:2–3 seems to reject the doctrines of the Docetists, who argued that Jesus never truly came in the flesh but was instead a kind of divine phantasm. 1 Timothy 6:20 may mark an rejection of early Gnostic thought, which argued that some secret and esoteric knowledge (γνῶσις or gnosis) was necessary for salvation. So yes, there is evidence of some early disagreement; this is not a great surprise, given human free will.

But what was the nature of these disagreements? How widespread were they, and what following did these alternate viewpoints have? We don’t have that information, since these mentions in the New Testament itself are the only sources we have even attesting to their existence at this early date, just as the New Testament documents are the only testimonies we have to the first-century Christian Church.

The Apostle John is traditionally held to have been really old when he died, around the turn of the second century.

Even more important: how early were these disputes? The first epistle of John (1 John) is believed to be one of the latest documents of the New Testament, written as late as the final decade of the first century. By that time, those who had personal experiences of Jesus had nearly all passed away. Paul’s first epistle to Timothy (1 Timothy) is generally believed to have been written toward the end of Paul’s ministry and life, between A.D. 62 and 67, also nearly a generation after Christ. A setting in which the firsthand witnesses to Jesus’s life and ministry were passing from the scene would have been ripe for the rise of new interpretations and viewpoints.

But of course, the rigorous skeptic would ask, how do we know which is the original viewpoint, and which are the alternative ones? In addition to examining the dating of the extant documents — the oldest texts, especially those written mere decades after Christ’s ministry, having at least the greatest authoritative claim — we should examine the authors of these texts, and question their claims to authority. In a similar way, in judging the reliability of ancient historians, we consider who they were and how they would have obtained their information. Thucydides, for example, is generally accepted as a reliable authority on his subject, he being a contemporary and firsthand participant in the Peloponnesian War.

Saint Paul Writing His Epistles (ca. 17th century), by Valentin de Boulogne (1591–1632).

To begin, let us consider Paul, the largest target, he being the author of the greater part of the New Testament. It is reasonable to accept that there was in fact a Christian leader named Paul who wrote a series of letters in the first century. It is also reasonable to accept that at least some of the letters we ascribe to Paul were in fact written by Paul. If this weren’t the case, we would have to ask why this Paul character had such authority if he never wrote anything authoritative. It is reasonable to accept, from the fact that his letters were accepted as authoritative, that Paul’s teaching and influence covered a fairly wide geographic area for the time, with Pauline letters being addressed to Christians in places as diverse as Philippi, Ephesus, Corinth, and Rome. We have no reason to question that Paul actually visited these places and taught those Christians in person: otherwise, no one would have accepted his letters as authoritative. These letters, if authentic, can be reasonably dated to the A.D. 50s and 60s, based on internal evidence.

Or, Shakespeare could have written St. Paul.

Of course, it is conceivable that “Paul” himself could have been an elaborate hoax perpetrated by someone writing in the second or third century, planting and disseminating Pauline letters around the Christian world (by that time vast). Perhaps Paul never existed at all, let alone visited any of the places he is supposed to have visited, and the supposed recipients of his letters never received them at all. ― But this line of reasoning presses “rigorous skepticism” to the point of the ridiculous.

St. Ignatius of Antioch

We know with reasonable certainty that Paul did exist; we know that his letters were disseminated among Christian communities fairly rapidly. Nearly all of the canonical Pauline letters were in circulation and were accepted by Christians by the end of the first century — by the testimony of Ignatius of Antioch, who quoted most of them explicitly in the letters he wrote to Christian communities around Syria and Asia Minor and to Rome. We can draw from Ignatius’s quotations both that he had access to the many New Testament documents he quotes — and probably knew them by memory, since it seems unlikely he would be traveling to his death carrying a full library — and also that the communities to which he was writing would have understood his allusions and their context also, having access to the same documents themselves. Also tellingly, he did not quote or allude to any other documents that were later rejected from the New Testament canon.

So it seems reasonable to conclude that Paul was widely accorded authority by at least some Christians as early as the A.D. 50s and 60s. These Christians were spread over a wide area, to nearly every corner of the world that the Christian message had then advanced — since, at least according to “orthodox” accounts, Paul was the one advancing it. The fact that he was accepted by Christian groups in many places and not by isolated sects is an argument in favor of his authority and reliability as an historical source. Organized, dissenting sects would have had identifiable leaders — just as we know the names of the major proponents of nearly all of the later “heresies.” Here there is no evidence at all of such organized sects during Paul’s lifetime — neither through literature of their own, nor through rigorous opposition that would have been evident in the surviving “orthodox” documents.

[There’s more where that came from! Stay tuned!]

“Rigorously skeptical”: Historical thoughts on the Christian faith

Posted on December 21, 2012 by Joseph T. Richardson

Christ Giving His Blessing (1481), by Hans Memling.

[This is a post that ballooned into about three posts when I sat down to write it. So I split it up, rather than giving you far more than anyone wants to read.]

Once again, my plans for what I was going to write about today have been disrupted. I had a heated discussion with a dear friend today that has set me to thinking. My friend is a self-proclaimed atheist, but a former Christian who has been deeply wounded. He is a thinker, a philosopher, and his mind works in ways that mine cannot. But I wanted to do my best to address his questions in a more thoughtful way, not in the heat of a moment.

To preface, I will say that though I’ve had some academic training, I am not an academic. I have not read deeply of the academic historiography of the early Church. I am a man of faith, and my faith informs everything I do. But my friend challenged that the historical claims of the Christian Church do not stand up to a “rigorously skeptical” examination; that they cannot be accepted without presuming that the claims of the Church are true, resulting in a circular argument. I disagree.

Darius the Great of Persia.

First, what is reasonable to expect in holding historical claims to a “rigorously skeptical” standard? Aren’t there many things in history that we accept as fact based on little and imperfect evidence? My friend has a background in ancient history, and though I’ve dabbled in that some, that has never been my bag; so I admit I am arguing from something I don’t know much about. But don’t we generally accept the narrative of the Persian Wars of Greece given by Herodotus and Xenophon, though neither was a contemporary, or Livy’s account of the early Roman republic, though he only saw the end of it? In the absence of any other testimony, it seems, historians treat theirs with reasonable skepticism, but nonetheless accept them as the best sources we have. Early Christianity and the historical testimonies to it should be held to the same standard.

So let’s take a look at early Christianity. My friend argues, as is widely accepted by secular academics, that there was no Christian orthodoxy in the beginning, and that what we today accept as “orthodoxy” is only the victor of a battle for supremacy among many competing Christian sects. All of my arguments, he challenges, rest on the assumption that the “orthodox” account of early Christian history today is true. He challenges that there are contradictions and inconsistencies in the New Testament that evince this early factiousness.

A leaf from Codex Vaticanus, one of the earliest extant manuscripts of the Greek New Testament.

I accept, with every reasonable textual scholar, that there are certain problems and inconsistencies in the text of the New Testament; but these, I argue, are minor, involving only details and chronologies, and do not affect the substance of any Christian doctrine they teach. These inconsistencies show only that the New Testament documents were written by different people at different times in different places, and that the authors weren’t all in constant communication with each other, to compare their notes and get their facts straight. To me, these inconsistencies are an argument in favor of the historical reliability of the New Testament rather than against it: we have several different people telling a story that is substantially the same.

Doctrinally, the documents of the New Testament demonstrate an even more telling consistency. Despite differences in emphases, each of the half-dozen or so writers of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, Paul, James, Jude — even more if one argues that John the Evangelist and John the Presbyter and John the Revelator were different people) expresses the same basic doctrines about Christ: that he was the Jewish Messiah, the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies; that he was the divine Son of God, to be identified with God Himself; that he died, was resurrected, and would come again in glory.

[It feels so unsatisfying to cut it off there. But that just gives you something to look forward to tomorrow.]

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A Christian's Road Home to Rome and Journey Onward

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