Faith Alone, the Early Church, and the Reformation
I was discussing the Doctrine of Faith Alone with a friend of mine recently. I asked this friend (OK, its Tony) about the absence of this doctrine from early church writings. He stated that it is in early church writings, especially the Letter of Paul to the Romans. So, I asked him why then, if it is so clearly taught in Romans, it is absent from Paul's time, say around 68 AD or so, until the Protestant Reformation, around 1509 AD. He went on to say that it is absent from the record until the Protestant Reformation because there was no need for the doctrine in Christian dialog until the need arose in the 16th century. Huh?
Anyone familiar with the concept of doctrinal development knows that the Church's understanding grows over time as She reevaluates the Deposit of Faith as handed down from the Apostles. A clear example of this is the doctrine of the Trinity. The language used by the Father's of the Church in the fourth century to try and come to grips with this doctrine is not necessarily biblical language, but rather Greek philosophical language. The Father's drew upon the Scriptures, but also their growing knowledge of philosophy to define, as best they could, an almost undefinable concept.
The reason I use the Trinity as an example is that no one familiar with doctrinal development would ever state that the doctrine of the Trinity was fully understood and taught as we know it today in the first 300 years leading up to Council of Nicaea. It did exist in the early church prior to the fourth century, but not in its finally defined form, which took an additional Council and the tireless work of Athanasius.
To say that Paul taught faith alone as we know it today in Romans, and that then the Church put it on the back shelf until needed in the 16th century, strikes me as naive and implausible. Why?
1. If Paul taught faith alone as we know it today in Romans, there would be a affirmation of this full blown doctrine in the writings of the Fathers of the Church. I mean, if a semi-developed doctrine of the Trinity is found in both Scripture and the early Fathers, why not faith alone?
2. Where did it go? Again, there is no evidence for this doctrine outside the Bible, or certain interpretations of the Bible.
3. Finally, even if faith alone did exist in both Scripture and with the early Fathers, the fact that a valid Church Council (like the one that defined the Trinity) neither adopted nor accepted it determines that is was neither taught in Scripture or by the early Fathers. For if it was, it would surely have been embraced and adopted by the same Church which brought it forth in the first place. Would it not?
Peace
BCH
posted by Dennis @ 9:42 AM
4 Comments:
OK, perhaps your blog name should be changed to "Blue Collar Strawman-Fest 2007." Just a suggestion...
First, justification by faith is not absent from the record; it is clearly taught by the apostle Paul in his NT letters. I can rehash the relevant passages and exposition if we need to do this again. Further, this wasn't even my claim in our conversation. The point I was trying to make was that the doctrine was not worked out with precision until the Reformation, not that it was completely absent in the early church fathers. As you know, church councils typically are in response to various doctrinal crises in the church, so it wasn't until the Reformation that "romish (I had to go there, sorry)" views and practices concerning justification went awry and stood in need of correction. The church was, ostensibly, incapable of self-correcting; thus, enter Luther and other reformers to bring clarity to the issue by working out a robust definition of justification that was biblically faithful. Thus, justification was not on "the back shelf until needed" in the early church, but rather was not worked out precisely until needed due to RC abuses in the middle ages. Big difference here.
You also say that if justification by faith were the correct view of justification, then there would be "full-blown affirmation" of the doctrine in the early church. This appears to be an inconsistency in your post. Here's the problem: you use the Trinity as an example of doctrinal development (which protestants acknowledge) in which there was NOT "full-blown affirmation" in the Bible. The seeds for the doctrine are present in the Bible, but the councils worked out the formulation in detail with an eye toward logical coherence. So, while there is affirmation of the Trinitarian doctrine in the Bible, there is nothing close to "full-blown affirmation;" but, then why does justification by faith require "full-blown affirmation"?
Further, you have not provided any specific evidence that the early fathers affirmed the current RC view of justification. All I have seen here is mere assertion. You make the claim concerning the fathers, thus you need to provide evidence for this claim.
Let me know if you need any suggestions on Lutheran or Anglican churches in Iowa City.
Talk to you later.
I could be wrong about this but I think faith alone and Luther's whole point of going about his business was for the common man, the lay person. This was not for the educated clergy to hash out doctrine in classrooms. Luther wanted average joe catholic to have a personal relationship with God, something they had been missing up until that point. Nominal and cultural catholics (as well as evangelicals today) have been throughout the centuries but that is another tangeant. I guess what I am saying is that Luther wanted to utilize the printing press for bibles, and created simply understood and slogan-esque doctrines like "faith alone" to reach the blind masses to have real and personal faiths.
I haven't read the other responses to your post, so hopefully I am not repeating anything they said. I would have to agree with your assertion here: "So, I asked him why then, if it is so clearly taught in Romans, it is absent from Paul's time, say around 68 AD or so, until the Protestant Reformation, around 1509 AD."
For instance, think on the following excerpts from the Apostolic Fathers:
"Why was our Father Abraham blessed? Was it not because he attained righteousness and truth through faith?"
"All, therefore, were glorified and magnified, not through themselves or their own works or the righteous actions which the did, but through his will. And so we, having been called through his will in Christ Jesus, are not justified through ourselves or through our own wisdom or understanding or piety or works which we have done in holiness of heart, but through faith, by which the almighty God has justified all who have existed from the beginning; to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen"
These two excerpts were from The Letter of the Romans to the Corinthians which is almost widely regarded by scholars to have been written around 95-97 a.d..
So, we now have the idea of "faith alone" thirty years beyond the time that you have initially posited. If you are wrong about it not going beyond "68 AD," perhaps you could be wrong about it being present after 95-97 AD, which I think I have demonstrated that it is at least present up until then.
I apologoize, I meant to say that "I would have to DISAGREE with your assertion..." in my first paragraph.
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