Path: christian
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
From: hedrick@cs.rutgers.edu
Subject: Where does the authority of Scripture come from?
Approved: christian@cs.rutgers.edu

Several posters have asked where the authority of the Bible comes
from.  This has come up in several discussions, including
Catholic/Protestant ones where Catholics wonder how Protestants can
find any authority that doesn't come from the Church, and
non-Christians asking the question generally of Christians.

My own view, as a moderately liberal Protestant, is that ultimately
authority has to come from God.  (I don't claim that this is in
distinction to Catholics -- they trace it as coming via a different
path however.)  Christianity is normally classified as a "revealed"
religion.  That is, we claim that it's only possible to know God
because he shows himself to us.  If he didn't, we would have no way of
knowing many of the important things of the faith.  (I'm not at the
moment interested in discussing whether we could know anything at all.
The concept of "natural theology" is a controversial one.  But I don't
know of anyone who believes that all of Christianity could be deduced
from natural theology alone.)  To me what makes the Bible important is
that it has a special status as primary conduit for revelation from
God.

As I am not in inerrantist, I do not believe that the Bible is in
itself a separate revelation.  However I do believe it transmits
revelation, and in practice it's probably our only authoritative
source for revelation.  The mode in which revelation is transmitted is
different for different books or portions.  E.g. the prophets' "thus
says the Lord", and Jesus' teachings are direct, whereas we often have
to do some reflection in order to see the implications of the
historical books.  But one way or the other, what makes the Bible
special is that it shows us two areas where God revealed himself to
people more directly than elsewhere.  The OT is the record of the
encounter between God and a set of people that he specifically chose
to be the bearers of enlightenment.  (I'm using the concept of the
Jews as the "chosen people", with the interpretation common in the 1st
Cent that God intended them to act as a "light to the Gentiles", i.e.
that they were chosen not just to live a privileged existence, but to
bring God's word to the world.)  The NT is the record of God's son,
both his own teachings and reflections on the meaning of his life,
death and resurrection.  I think both the role of chosen people and
the role of God's son involve revelation.  These are areas of history
where God has decided to show himself in two specific and unusual
ways.

In highlighting the experience of ancient Israel and Jesus, I do not
mean to limit God's revelation.  The Holy Spirit is present where he
wills.  However the experience of the Church makes it clear that we
need ways of judging and interpreting purported revelations.  I
believe the specific role of Israel and Jesus give the OT and NT a
unique status as "key" instruments of revelation.  They act as
standards by which to judge others.  An obvious question would be why
Christian history after the 1st Cent. doesn't have a similar function.
My reading is that the Church has a somewhat different status than
Israel.  I believe Jesus gave his disciples, and through them us, a
kind of responsiblity that was not present in Israel.  In Israel, God
spoke directly through prophets.  In the church, we have the
responsibility for acting for God.  We are no longer led by direct
oracles, but are expected to take more responsibility in carrying out
the Gospel.  While this is in some ways a higher status than ancient
Israel, it does mean that there is no one in the church who can play
the same role as the prophets of Israel, nor is God taking quite the
same direct role in our history that he did for Israel.  I still value
Christian tradition, probably more than many Protestants.  But I
wouldn't consider it a direct revelation in a sense that would justify
extending the Bible to include it.

Thus I trace the authority of the Bible to the events that it reports,
and to those who speak in it, and through them to God.  I believe we
have reason to consider these particular events and people as having
been designated by God as authoritative agents of revelation, so that
they can be used to judge or interpret other areas where we believe
God is at work.

Note that I don't regard the specific set of books as critical, as
long as we continue to have a good picture of Jesus and of the
religious experience of Israel.  While I would not like to lose one of
the gospels, it's hard to argue that the world would be terribly
different if there were only 3.  Similarly with Jude or Philemon.  Nor
would the inclusion of the Shepherd of Hermas have caused serious
damage.  (I mention it because of all the books that didn't make it,
it probably came as close as any.)  Similarly, if we should find
another Gospel that included material that was as early and reliable
as the 4 Gospels, I could conceive of it coming to be thought of as
canonical.  However I do not subscribe to the thesis that the choice
of the current books was completely arbitrary and political.  There
seems to me to be a fairly clear difference between the canonical
Gospels and the NT apocrypha, in terms of historical plausibility.  Of
course no 1st Cent. writer intended to produce a disinterested
historical account.  But I believe history was important to the
canonical writers in a way that it was not to others.  I don't want to
argue about the OT apocrypha here, because of the variations among
different Christians in treatment of it.  But there too, I believe we
have a good enough picture of how God was working with Israel.  A few
books one way or the other seems not to be critical.

Answers to some specific questions:

1) So if the NT is so critical, how did the church get along before
the NT existed?

I'm less concerned with the exact canon than with the contents, so
we're talking about the period before the Gospels and letters were
widely used, not the period until the exact list of books finally
converged.  During that period, Jesus' life and teachings were
available through Jesus' disciples, or at most the next generation.
The exact point at which written records become more reliable than
personal memories is hard to define.  If we were living in the 2nd
Cent. there might be a legitimate argument as to the relative
authority of written records and tradition passed on verbally.  But
certainly by the 20th Cent it's clear that the NT gives us a more
reliable source of information about Jesus than any traditions that
may have been passed on in other ways.

2) The Church decided which books should go into the Bible.  This
means that its authority came from the Church.

I maintain that the Church recognized the authority of the Bible, but
did not create it.  Certainly they simply recognized the authority of
the OT.  Even in the case of the NT, I believe it's most accurate to
think of the church as recognizing which books had apostolic
authority, and not bestowing authority on books for itself.