Sola Scriptura

“Unless I am convinced by Sacred Scripture or by evident reason, I will not recant. My conscience is held captive by the Word of God and to act against conscience is neither right nor safe.” These were the words spoken by Martin Luther at the Diet of Worms in 1521. He was on trial for his writings and doctrinal positions that put him in the position of being called a demon and a heretic by the Roman Catholic Church. It was Luther’s belief in the authority of the Scriptures that lead him to argue that the Pope and the church councils are able and in fact had erred. Therefore for Luther the church was not infallible in its interpretation of the Scriptures and its traditions set down according to those interpretations. This put him at odds with the church who believed that the Scriptures and the Roman Church were infallible sources of special revelation.

The dispute over sola Scriptura was a dispute over authority. Who had the authority to bind the conscience of believers in the church, was it the church and the Scriptures or the Scriptures alone? The reformers were not averse to recognizing God given authority in the church through her offices, creeds and confessions. But they saw these authorities as subordinate to God’s authority through his Word. And when the churches traditions, creeds, and confessions made demands on her people contrary to the authority of God’s Word then she needed reforming according to the Word. Only God who is infallible has the right to bind the consciences of his children in his church through his infallible Word alone. But even in our day the true doctrine of sola Scriptura is confused.

In our modern culture we have elevated the autonomous or individual reason to the place of an infallible authority. In the church it is common to believe that the Scriptures are the only “basis of authority”. In our “no creeds but Christ” church culture it is the autonomous reason that has taken the place of the Roman Catholic tradition. In the time of the Reformation the Roman Catholic Church believed that the infallible Scriptures and the infallible Pope and Church were the authority. But now the individual reason has taken the place of the church and Pope as an infallible source of authority. It says, “I am my own interpreter, I am my own authority based on what I believe the Scriptures say”. In this present climate change in the church it does not necessarily matter what you believe as long as you do not believe that I have to believe or interpret the Bible in the same way you do or according to a standard. This is why we have churches emerging that do not stress or even have church membership. Church membership infringes upon the individual. It causes the church to have to rule and teach authoritatively from a standard given them by God in subordination to the Scriptures.

In our modern church culture of “solo Scriptura” (the Scripture is the sole basis of authority) any God given authority in the church which is subordinate to the Scriptures is replaced by man’s own reason. In the time of the Reformation were Martin Luther and other reformers only studying the Bible? And were they only studying the Bible through their own thought lenses? When I was in graduate school taking a class in hermeneutics I was taught to come to the Bible with no preconceived notions or thoughts, no presuppositions about the Scripture I was studying. This teaching was borrowed from Lewis Sperry Chafer founder of Dallas Theological Seminary who said, “the very fact that I did not study a prescribed course in theology made it possible for me to approach the subject with an unprejudiced mind and to be concerned only with what the Bible actually teaches.” This is an approach resting on the infallibility of the individual in interpreting Scripture. Keith Mathison says, “Each of us comes to the Scripture with different presuppositions, blind spots, ignorance of important facts, and, most importantly, sinfulness. Because of this we each read things into Scripture that are not there and miss things in Scripture that are there.” Martin Luther and other reformers used by God in the 16th and 17th centuries did not interpret the Scriptures as the sole basis of authority. They recognized that though men and councils in the church could ere nonetheless they depended upon the creeds and confessions and writings of the church in the past. This is why when Charles of Germany handed down his decisions regarding Luther at the Diet of Worms he connected him with the teachings of the pre-reformers John Wycliffe, Jon Hus and the Waldensians. Luther was not original in his understandings and interpretations. In his debate with Johann Eck he quoted as much of Augustine and the church fathers as he did the Scriptures in defending his positions. The modern church must be careful that she does not abandon the ancient paths in the pursuit of the autonomous infallible self.

The modern church needs the authoritative Word that has produced creeds, confessions and writings that still guide her to this day. The Word of God alone can bind the consciences of God’s beloved church, but it is not the sole basis of authority. God has given his church fallible yet authoritative offices, creeds and confessions as subordinate to the Word of God. Yet the Scripture alone is the infallible, expired, special revelation of God which is the formal cause of the churches reformation then, now and forevermore. Ecclesia semper reformanda est.