Scriptural Authority 9

Catholic Church

"Apart from Christian tradition, there is no reason whatever to regard the Bible as anything other that what it obviously is, naturally speaking: a collection of disparate writings produced at various times by various authors, without consultation of one another, dealing with only such matters as were uppermost in the minds of the several writers, totally ignoring others, occasioned in large part by circumstances of casual occurrence. There was no antecedent "grand design" for the whole Bible, nor even for the whole New Testament, conceived by any human author. Granting that we have in the New Testament a gathering of writings dating from apostolic times and directly or indirectly attributable to apostolic authorship, what guarantee is there that they represent "the full range and variety of understanding" of apostolic Christianity, any more than the Federalist papers represent the full range and variety of understanding among a group of men only when they set out on purpose to develop such a thing, not when a few of their papers, written independently at different times and places and in ignorance of one another, are gathered together only at a much later date." Reference 9

"The Scriptures give written confirmation to tradition, and tradition is necessary to explicate the Scriptures." Reference 10

Scriptures

The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever. ~Psalm 12:6-7

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.~Colossians 2:8

That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. ~I Corinthians 2:5

Comments

The scriptures have a much different view of themselves than given by the Catholic Church. Gods words have been kept and preserved forever. God is certainly able! These words of God have been collected and compiled and are part of a "Grand Design" called the "Bible". The scriptures warn to beware after the wisdom and traditions of men that the Catholic church so heavily leans upon!