The Language of this Blog - The Sacred and The Profane

You may have noticed two gadgets on the right side of this blog, the Cuss-O-Meter and the Intelligence Meter. I have a Cuss-O-Meter Rating of Absolute Zero and a Genius Rating for my blog, both ratings I intend to keep.

I have been accused of ingorance because I do not use the Language of Calvinism, which I call Calvin's Cant. I do not usually use the words Mongerism, Prevenient, Reprobation, Supralapsarianism, or other words in the dictionary of Calvin's Cant. Granted, I could guarantee my Genius Rating by using these long words, but it there isn't sufficient cause to do so. To tell the Truth, it would be easier for me to cuss on this blog than to use Calvin's Cant, hence my use of the Cuss-O-Meter. I am certainly capable of understanding Calvin's Cant, just as I understand Profanity; however, neither is part of my Normal Vocabulary. Using Profanity makes me feel unclean, but using Calvin's Cant makes me feel even worse.

You may have noticed that my positions are extremely critical of Calvinsm, yet though I am among the Arminians, my arguments are not Armenian arguments. This is because I am outside both Arminian and Calvinist Religious Traditions. I do not take the Middle Ground between Arminianism and Calvinism, but rather consider Arminianism to be the Middle Ground between myself and the Calvinists. I am not even a Protestant, though I started life as a Protestant. Then I grew up. My earliest years were spent debating the issues of Free Will and Predestination. Then Desiridus Erasmus came my way. As my thoughts turned elsewhere, the following Erasmus quote became more relavant:

. . . philosophers in their long beards and short cloaks, who esteem themselves the only favourites of wisdom, and look upon the rest of mankind as the dirt and rubbish of the creation: yet these men’s happiness is only a frantic craziness of brain; they build castles in the air, and infinite worlds in a vacuum.

As I grew, I became Eastern Orthodox by degrees, where I learned that I was partaking in the wrong debates altogether. Granted, Arminians were usually my allies, but it was only because John Wesley heavily borrowed Eastern Orthodox arguments to debate the Calvinists. Eastern Orthodoxy is a Major Branch of Christianity; wheras, Calvinism is but a splinter group in a different Branch of Christianity.

It would also be a mistake to consider me an Arminian. I do not draw my lines down Arminian versus Calvinist lines. I draw them down Orthodox versus Gnostic lines. Though the Gnostics are officially defunct, there are plenty of Neo-Gnostics about. My problem is that the Calvinists are making the very compromises that legitimize the Neo-Gnostics. The line I draw puts most of the Arminians on my side of the line, at least nominally. While the line is not necessarily coincident with the line between Calvinism and Arminianism, it certainly goes through the Calvinist Camp, probably somewhere near the line between Calvinism and HyperCalvinism.

Once this is understood, the Issues of the Consequences of Biblical Integrity, you will be more attuned to this blog. Calvinism makes too many sacrifices of the Integrity of the Bible, and gets the brunt of my pen's wrath; however, I find that Arminians are often lukewarm on this issue, although far more receptive.

Back to my point about Profanity and Calvin's Cant, I find that the language you use, as well as the language you don't use, reflects those who use it. That's why I avoid both Vocabularies, even though I can use both, and often interchangeably. In fact, if anyone complains on this blog that I don't understand Hermeneutics, I plan to reciprocate by visiting said person's blog and complain that they don't understand Profanity, possibly giving some examples. I'll not be judged as Duns Scotus was, for the excessive dichotomization and superfluous discoursing for which he earned his Crown, the Dunce Cap.

Chapter XXXI of The Westminster Confession: A Trojan Horse

Firstly, I wish to convey my Eternal Gratitude to Matt for giving the most damaging argument against, and the Final Nail in the Coffin of, Article XXXI of the Westminster Confession, the Doctrine of Illumination! While I was merely intending to debunk it, Illuminaton has given me the means to Totally Anihilate it! Thanks, Matt!!!

When I first read about Calvin's Institutions, I first thought he meant the most basic of all Church Institutions, the Church Council. Searching intently, I was gravely dissapointed. What I found was contained in Chapter XXXI of the Westminster Confession in Chapter IV :

IV. All synods or councils since the apostles' times, whether general or particular, may err, and many have erred; therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith or practice, but to be used as a help in both.

What a dissapointment! Further research revealed that John Calvin was actually agiainst the Seven Church Councils, and the Westminster Confession delegitimized them with Chapter XXXI. In fact Chapter XXXI goes even further. ALL Church Councils are invalid because of Sin. Their pronouncements upon doctrine are meaningless. The Nicene Creed, a product of the Councils of Nicea and Chalcedon, has been voided. Other products of other Councils, in partcular Carthage 397 which selected the books of the Bible while discarding the Gnostic Scriptures, are void! Of course, there is also the paradox/logical conclusion that the Westminster Confession and the Council of Dordt are also void because of Chapter XXXI.

Let us examine the consequences of Chapter XXXI upon the Bible. Carthage 397 is invalid and can be overruled. This means that the Books of the Bible can be reselected from the candidate books, which include the Gnostic Gospels. The Gnostic Gospels, like any other set of scriptures, are self-authenticating. Clearly, Chapter XXXI is a Trojan Horse that permits the suplanting of the current books of the New Testament.

However, thanks to Matt who reminds us of the Doctrine of Illumination, the Church Fathers were indeed made competant to separate Wheat from Chaff, a point religiously ignored by Chapter XXXI. According to Matt: "God first and continually bestows holiness upon the sinner through justification and sanctification. Illumination is that process whereby the Holy Spirit overcomes the lingering sin of the redeemed so that he can correctly interpret Scripture. ", a point ignored by the Chapter XXXI. Yet he backpeddles with: "I am not claiming that Illumination conveys holiness. The Spirit does that legally in justification and experientially in sanctification." However, I will take Matt's first statement at face value and observe that his first argument effectively restores the Seven Church Councils and the Nicene Creed to their former credibility, no thanks to the Westminster Confession. Thanks again, Matt!

I would be remiss in my duty if I did not mention what I would replace Article XXXI with. Since it is a Trojan Horse, I would delete it altogether. Since God's Word is Eternal, a Doctrine of Stairs Decisis is what would be called for.

Edited-Not Translated

In previous posts, I dealt peripherally with attempts to modify the Bible from without via the selection of scripture. Today, I will deal with the attempt to edit Scripture itself. Appropriately, I have selceted Revelation 22:19 that deals with that topic. While this verse tells the consequences of the editing of Scripture, the intent is to show how it has been done, and not to sermonize about it.

At this juncture, I must state that I have been criticized for not delving into hermeneutics, with the parsing and interpretation of the Bible's language that it entails. To make such a criticism ignores the Reduction to an Absurdity Method of Mathematics which is the prevalent mode of analysis of this blog. The analysis used is prone to counterproductive Paradoxes induced by the Self-Referentiality that hermeneutics introduces. Nevertheless, when the findings do not include paradoxes, I will use hermeneutics, as I did here to Compare Scripture with Scripture. Additionally, hermeneutics uses Inductive Reasoning, whereas I have stated before that the methodology I generally use is Deductive Reasoning.

There is no proper way to quote Revelation 22:19 in the 1599 Geneva Study Bible, but I will display it:

What is important about this particular citation of scripture is that it isn't there. It has been replaced with a footnote that says that it has been combined with verse 18. Verse 20 is included to show that this verse, in fact, has been skipped.

Following John Calvin's precept that we should compare Scripture with Scripture, I have included other versions of the Bible for the very comparison that John Calvin reccommends:

New International Version

And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

Weymouth New Testament

and that if any one takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take from him his share in the Tree of Life and in the holy city--the things described in this book.

The KJV Strong's Version

And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

The Darby Translation

And if any one take from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life, and out of the holy city, which are written in this book.

The New American Standard Bible

and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book.

These are all fine Protestant versions of the Bible that say the same thing. Lets see what the Roman Catholics have to say:

The New Jerusalem Bible

if anyone cuts anything out of the prophecies in this book, God will cut off his share of the tree of life and of the holy city, which are described in the book.

Praise the Lord! Even the Catholics agree! The Eastern Orthodox are in the process of publishing their own Eastern Orthodox Bible in English. Just for fun, let's look at what they say. It's still in manuscript form and will be published late in 2009, so if you turn to page 567 in the pdf, you find:



It looks like even the Orthodox agree with the rest of Christondom on this point.

Let us examine why someone would want to have this verse "de-emphasized" from the Scripture. It states that if someone, even one of the Elect should willfully remove this verse from scripture, then Predestination is no longer in effect because a Willful Act overrode it. Isn't that what happened here?

This debunks Predestination. To replace it, I concur with the Doctrine of Divine Grace which is best summarized in the Protestant Hymn: Whosover Will, May Come!

A Book Report: Against Heresies by St. Irenaeus

Let us start with this book's most obvious fault: It is incredibly boring! Unless you get the point of the book, all you get is Bragging Rights from reading it. The plot is repetitive. Written in the pretensive diction required to fairly state the Doctrines of the Gnostics, the plot is that a god and a goddess make love, have a godling, and give their little godling a ridiculous name. The little godling grows up, finds another goddess to fall in love with and procreate with and another godling is born to recieve another ridiculous name. This goes on for 20-30 pages. In St. Irenaeus'es Obvious Defense with respect to boredom, he is quoting typical Gnostic Gospels, so that the Gnostics are the Real Bores!

Then, St. Irenaeus gets to the point. Why would gods and goddess procreate just to give their little godlings ridiculous names? Would not these gods and godessess, the dieties of the Gnostics, be of questionable Wisdom, and therefore not be dieties at all? This is the highlight of the book.

Then, the book gets REALLY BORING!!! St. Irenaeus states that this mindless procreation and baby-naming is the boilerplate of all of the varities of Gnostic Scripture. The rest of the book becomes a Taxonomy of the Gnostics, analogous to a Field Guide to the birds of a given area. St. Irenaeus goes into the various species of Gnostics and their holy books, in much the same manner that a Bird Watcher would go about writing a Field Guide. [There goes a Ruby Crested Gnostic now! Listen to his distinctive warble!]

Despite its obvious shortcomings, Against Heresies is a VERY NECESSARY book! It is the first guide to heterodox beliefs by a Christain author. Historically, this book became the driving force that prevented the Gnostics from hijacking Early Christianity in its Infancy by intermingling their Scripture with Christain Scripture. Against Heresies did its job in the only way it could, and its influence is as great as any other book on Christianity. Without this book, the Bible might not have been compiled for several hundred more years, if at all.

By what Authority were the Books of the Bible selected?

Let us look at Chapter One of the Westminster Confession of 1646. The meat is in Article 2, where the books are enumerated, Article 3 which declares the Apocrypha illigitimate, and Article 4 which says:

IV. The authority of the holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed and obeyed, dependeth not upon the testimony of any man or Church, but wholly upon God (who is truth itself), the Author thereof; and therefore it is to be received, because it is the Word of God.

The trouble with Article 4 is that it misses the point. By what authority does the Westminster Confession declare what the books of the Bible are? It doesn't say. We have only their word, the word of an uncredentialed authority. There isn't even the mention of a credentialed authority. If there is a credentialed authority, the Westminster Confession has certainly detracted from it in their very first Chapter.

Who would have credentials. The Jews had their own Cannonization Process for their Torah, our Old Testament, which is generally accepted by Christianity. Thus, restricting the question to the New Testament, all New Testament credentials and authority would derive from Christ. Since almost all of the New Testament books were not written until after the death of Christ, his authority must have flowed somewhere to make the New Testament valid. The Apostles are generally considered the recipients of this authority. Yet none of the Apostles, not even John, were alive when the collection of scripture which became the New Testament was finally agreed upon. The Apostles had successors, who inherited their authority and held the Office of Bishop, hence a Doctrine of Apostolic Succession is needed in order to maintain the Bible. Recapitulating, the Authority flowed from Christ to the Apostles, and from the Apostles to the Apostolic Successors to authenticate the Bible.

Historically, the Council of Carthage of 397 AD set the de facto standard for what qualified a book to be in the Bible. The one thing about a de facto standard is that even though it is not necessarily legally in force, it recieves acceptance because of necessity, and because no one else is able to come up with anything better. The Council of Carthage had plenty of necessity justification for what they did, as their purpose was to discard the Gnostic Gospels from the Cannon which were about to polute and overwhelm the Cannon, a situation which Bishop Irenaeus warned against in Against Heresies. One does not pick a Holy Book out of the gutter, from whence the Gnostic Gospels came. At issue was what a what books to keep, what books to discard, and by what authority. The solution, roughly described as the Smell Test of St. Irenaeus, was to requre that each accepted book have a demonstrable connection to an Apostle, a property of the Most Frequently Used Books by the Oldest Churches with the Closest Connection to an Apostle. Additionally, the Scriptures had to be consistent with each other. We note in passing that the Apocrypha contains valuable history which assists with the Cannonization Process, contrary to Chapter 1, Article 3.

The problem with deemphasizing the Council of Carthage of 397 as an unimportant council is that it delegitimizes their purpose of discarding the Gnostic Gospels from the Scriptures, thus opening the door for reinstating the Gospels of Judas, Thomas, and Philip, the Apocalypse of St. Peter, and various and sundry other Gnostic Gospels. There is no contemporary alternate authority from which to draw legitimacy.

Coming full circle, the Westminster Confession mindfully and arbitrarily skips the authentication of the Bible. It does not give any reason to discard any Gnostic Gospel, other than the fact that they were not mentioned. Hence, since the Gnostic Gospels were not explicitly excluded, the Westminster provides implicit grounds to include them in Scripture. This problem is in addition to the Westminster Confession's inability to qualify their own authority. Further, since the Westminster Confession some 1250 years after Carthage, the connection to the Apostles is at least three times as dilute, should the Apostolic Succession argument be attempted. As we continue our examination of the Westminster Confession, we will find that a foundation was laid to delegitimize any and all findings of Church Councils in Chapter XXXI, which in turn legally permits the eventual overruling of the Council of Carthage and the Reselection of the Books of the Bible.

Doctrinal Paradoxes

We owe it to Mathematician Kurt Gödel that paradoxes derive from self-referentiality. This causes problems with the belief that the Bible being "self-authenticating". By construct, there are other holy books which must, of necessity, be self-authenticating. Even Mathematical Texts are self-authenticating. Such a weak claim of self-authentication detracts, rather than enhances, the Truth of the Bible. If I am to maintain my Christianity, I can have no use for "self-authentication".

Let us recognize that there have been several attempts to control the message of the Bible, either by the insertion of false books into the Bible as was tried by the Gnostics in the first three centuries of Christianity tried to do, or by the editing of Biblical content to maintain pet doctrines, such as the editing of the Bible to de-emphasize scripture, say Revelation 22:19 to protect a pet doctrine.

The main focus, however, is to investigate the underpinnings of if the Bible were true in relation to Doctrine. Case in point are the doctrines of Monergism and Total Depravity. If Mongerism and/or Total Depravity were true, than Man can in no way further the cause of his own salvation, or for that matter, the salvation of another. The translating, publishing, and commentary on the Bible are activities which, if competently done, furthers the salvation of Man. Therefore, the Bible cannot be competently translated, published, or commented upon. Since this is a conclusion that I cannot accept without the abandonment of the Bible or Christianity, I must discard Mongerism and Total Depravity.

The sieve I use to separate Wheat from Chaff is the Reduction to an Absurdity technique of Mathematicians. This blog's premise is that anything that undermines the Bible, its authority, and the Canonization process, from which the Bible was determined, is void. In consequence, I must oppose various forms of NeoGnosticism or premises that legitimatize NeoGnosticism as certain confessions of faith would do. Said compromises with NeoGnosticism opens the way for the inclusion of previously discarded books from the Bible, in particular, the gospels of Judas, Thomas, and Phillip, and the Apocalypse of St. Peter. Since Cannonization was a MetaScriptural Process, this blog must also be MetaScriptural. When Scripture is actually quoted, it will be generally be used to demonstrate that a particular version of the Bible is Edited, Not Translated in this blog.

Theological Responsibility requires that if a doctrine gets refuted, it must either be replaced by by a plausibe doctrine, or that it wasn't needed to begin with. To be Theologically Responsible, my refutation of Monergism has made me Synsegistic by default. Since there is Sin in this World, I have to account for it in consequence to debunking Total Depravity. I find both the Doctrine of Original Sin and the Doctrine of the Corruption of the Nature of Man both acceptable doctrines at this point.

I must make one last observation. There is an obscure "Doctrine of Illumination", apparently propounded by St. Augustine, that God can cause a person to be illumined. Illumination does not confer Holiness. It follows that an Illumined Sinner is still a Totally Depraved Sinner, and the incompetance to translate, copy, print, interpret, or comment upon the Bible still remains. Chapter XXXI of the Westminster Confession, to be discussed later, actually concedes the point by stating that ALL Church Councils are invalid because they are Sinful without imputing ANY Illumination to ANY Church Council.