Arguments Against Protestantism Part II
In John 17:1, our Lord prayed for us, saying,
And now I am no more in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.
St. Paul wrote,
I appeal to you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment.
1 Corinthians 1:10
But God has so composed the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior part, that there may be no discord in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.
1 Corinthians 12:24-25
Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
Galatians 5:19-21
It is made clear that schism (“dissension” and “discord”) from the Church is a serious sin. So much so that St. Paul put it in the same list as fornication and idolatry. The Body of Christ is meant to be one and united. Yet it seems to be common for Protestant denominations to split off. A prima facie reading of Scripture shows that these splits are not the work of the Holy Spirit (as the schismatics claim), but works of the flesh.
Our Lord wanted us to be one, but sola scriptura has brought nothing but dissension. Our Lord said,
Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? So, every sound tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears evil fruit. A sound tree cannot bear evil fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits.
Matthew 7:15-20
Does all this splitting amongst the many Protestant denominations seem like good fruit? Not unless we want to disregard St. Paul’s list of evil works in Galatians. Thus, a major problem within Protestantism seems to be the bad fruit it bears of constant schism.
Against the Clarity of Scripture
The immediate response as to why there are so many Protestant denominations is that they disagree on secondary issues. Some Protestants prefer more structured worship, while others prefer free-flowing services. Overall, Scripture is clear on important matters, but less clear on issues like governance or marriage.
However, this is demonstrably false. An issue like Baptism is not “secondary.” It is a primary issue because it is either necessary for salvation or it isn’t. If a Church is actively withholding Baptism for newcomers because “it isn’t necessary,” they are withholding them from being saved. And without a merciful act from God acting outside the bounds of His Sacraments, they may very well be allowing them to be damned to hell.
This doctrine is called the clarity of Scripture. As gotquestions.org defines it:
In short, the doctrine of perspicuity [clarity] means that the central message of the Bible is clear and understandable and that the Bible itself can be properly interpreted in a normal, literal sense.
https://www.gotquestions.org/perspicuity-of-Scripture.html
But if Scripture isn’t clear enough to show a good portion of Christians whether Baptism is necessary for salvation, then it is clearly false that “the central message of the Bible is clear and understandable and that the Bible itself can be properly interpreted in a normal, literal sense.” So much for this definition.
The Reformed Baptist theologian Wayne Grudem, in his monumental work Systematic Theology, defines clarity more precisely,
We may define the clarity of Scripture as follows: the clarity of Scripture means the Bible is written in such a way that it is able to be understood, but right understanding requires time, effort, the use of ordinary means, a willingness to obey, and the help of the Holy Spirit; and our understanding will remain imperfect in this lifetime.
Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2020), page 109.
Rather than merely prompting the Holy Spirit to resolve all issues, as some are tempted to do, Grudem adds that time, effort, the use of ordinary means, and a willingness to obey are ways to at least have a closer understanding of Scripture. Of course, with the caveat that it “will remain imperfect.” However, a lurking problem remains with all of these requirements.
Protestantism De Jure Sans De Facto
Grudem humbly submits his intellect to being imperfect. However, I assume that he truly believes his interpretation of Scripture is correct, and that he also believes Catholic and Eastern Orthodox interpretations are gravely mistaken. Not only that, but also the interpretations of other non-Reformed Protestants have strayed. If these are all God-loving Christians, then why do so many people diverge from the “true” teaching found in Scripture, according to Grudem? He writes,
The existence of many disagreements about the meaning of Scripture throughout history reminds us that the doctrine of the clarity of Scripture does not imply or suggest that all believers will agree on all the teachings of Scripture. Nevertheless, it does tell us something very important – that the problem always lies not with Scripture but with ourselves… we affirm that all the teachings of Scripture are clear and able to be misunderstood, but we also recognize that people (through their own shortcomings) misunderstand what is clearly written in Scripture.
Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2020), page 129.
Grudem further substantiates this claim by showing how people come to interpret Scripture falsely. He writes,
(1) On the one hand, it may be that we are seeking to make affirmations where Scripture itself is silent. In such cases we should be more ready to admit that God has not given us the answer to our quest and to allow for differences of viewpoint within the church… (2) On the other hand, it is possible that we have made mistakes in our interpretation of Scripture. This could have happened because the data we used to decide a question of interpretation were inaccurate or incomplete. Or it could be because there is some personal inadequacy on our part, whether it be, for example, personal pride, greed, lack of faith, selfishness, giving too much credence to non-Christian convictions in the surrounding culture, or even failing to devote enough time to prayerfully reading and studying Scripture.
Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2020), page 129.
Grudem is not pointing his finger at Catholics and other non-Reformed Christians for falling for these mistakes. Grudem is showing why Christians make mistakes in interpretation more generally, which can be applied to Christians who disagree with him, or could explain why Grudem was wrong at a prior time compared to a later time, or why he could fall into heresy at a later time when his prior convictions were correct.
I will get into the first point later, but for now I will focus on the second. There is an epistemological error made by those who use Grudem’s explanations to prove an interpretation is false. Namely, sin, laziness, and ignorance are de jure objections without the de facto.
I’ve spoken many times about the de jure/de facto distinction in my essays, so I recommend you check those out. You may also check the work of Alvin Plantinga, who goes into this distinction in depth.
Much like how Freud reduced belief in God to wishful thinking as a coping mechanism, or how Marx conjures God up to an opioid, so too do Protestants reduce interpretative diversity to sin and ignorance. Contrary to Freud, belief in God could be wishful thinking, but it wouldn’t be inherently irrational if God existed and wanted to be known by the person. Perhaps wishful thinking is the start of the process to fuller knowledge of Him. One would have to prove God false before asserting Freud’s wishful-thinking objection. And, like Freud and Marx, without the de facto objection, the Protestant explanation automatically fails as an argument against other interpretations. Belief in non-Reformed interpretations could result from sin and ignorance, but it cannot be inherently irrational unless the interpretation itself is proven false.
One may argue that one couldn’t come closer to true interpretations through sin and ignorance. However, this response fails on two grounds: first, it commits a genetic fallacy against the proposition. That is, it would be fallacious to argue, “Oh, that belief is false due to your sin and ignorance!” Second, there would be symmetry problems since it remains possible that all interpretations can be accepted by any sinner. If a drunken womanizer just accepted everything Wayne Grudem said, Grudem cannot claim the womanizer believes in false interpretations. Sure, he may argue his reasoning is faulty, but his interpretations would still be correct, according to Grudem.
Appealing to the Holy Spirit does nothing to help the Protestant avoid this critique. All Protestants will claim that the Holy Spirit guided them towards their contradictory interpretations. Should we believe the Holy Spirit intentionally leads people to false beliefs? By no means!
Again, what is needed here is a de facto objection. Saying the Holy Spirit guided you assumes that people who interpret the Scriptures differently from you weren’t guided by the Holy Spirit. How do you know this? What is the argument? Appealing to sin and ignorance at this deeper level are still de jure objections without the de facto.
Seeking Affirmations
The typical and sophisticated responses against the clarity of Scripture fail to address the de jure/de facto distinction, and in conjunction with the argument that sola scriptura and the doctrine of clarity bear the fruit of schism, this is at least very good grounds to be skeptical of Protestantism in general.
I will make a deeper critique here that is independent of the first critique, but one that I still think succeeds.
Suppose the Protestant wants to say, “Okay, maybe there are some issues between the mainlines and the popular denominations. But we can at least see obvious cases where an interpretation is false. For example, ones we see from Liberal Christians who try to justify homosexuality. As Grudem says, they are ‘seeking to make affirmations where Scripture itself is silent.’” “Not so fast!” I say.
What is the de facto objection against the Liberal Christians? It’s not sin and ignorance, since those are de jure. It can’t be theological, since theology is derived from the interpretation of Scripture in conjunction with natural reason. The Conservative Christian can point out, “Hey, Leviticus 18:22 is pretty clear!” Perhaps, though, God is progressive. Perhaps God was wrong about putting this in there. Perhaps God can create contradictions. Again, what is the de facto objection here? You can quote thousands of passages in response, but they will all be moot unless we conjoin them with the defeaters that show God cannot be progressive, wrong, or logically contradictory.
The point being this: theological critiques implicitly assume specific interpretations of Scripture within a system which itself hasn’t been proven true, and cannot be self-referentially proven, and therefore, cannot serve as de facto defeaters for competing interpretations in relation to other contrary theological systems. Even internal critiques of logical incoherence can sometimes fail, since some systems allow God to create logical contradictions. So, theologically-based Scriptural critiques are inherently de jure objections against competing theological systems. Therefore, there aren’t any “obvious” interpretations of Scripture which automatically disprove Liberal Christianity. Merely pointing out that they affirm propositions where “Scripture is silent” is self-referential to a theological system and its Scriptural interpretations, which Liberals do not accept.
If only Jesus established a Church with the authority to bind and loose, and to interpret Scripture so that the gates of hell won’t prevail against it. Wouldn’t that Rock?
Citations
- https://www.gotquestions.org/perspicuity-of-Scripture.html
- Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2020)
Biblical Citations
- John 17:1
- 1 Corinthians 1:10
- 1 Corinthians 12:24-25
- Galatians 5:19-21
- Matthew 7:15-20
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