Editorial – Living by Every Word, Part III

At the Council of Trent, convened to determine how to stop Protestantism (1545-1563), four propositions were made which have affected Bible translations ever since that time.  These four propositions were four condemnations that first condemned the Protestant doctrine that the Holy Scriptures contained all things necessary for salvation, and that it was impious to place apostolic tradition on a level with Scripture.

This condemnation is two-fold, first condemning the doctrine that the Bible contains all things necessary to salvation.  What do the Scriptures teach in regard to what is necessary for Salvation?  Is there any moral duty required of man that God somehow did not have put in His holy book so that the church had to develop it over the next few thousand years?  (Tradition is still developing, for instance look at the debate over the role of Mary, the mother of Jesus, in the plan of salvation.  Traditions which are totally absent from the New Testament, but have been developing for hundreds of years.  Does the Bible say anything specific in regard to this question?  Indeed it does: “Every Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for discipline [or could be translated “instruction” in the sense of instruction a child receives from his parents, or “upbringing.”] in order that the man of God might be complete, fully equipped for every good work.” II Timothy 3:16, 17.  The word translated “complete” is much more than “perfect.” A blade of wheat first coming up can be perfect, but it is not complete. To be complete means much more than to be perfect—it means to be lacking in nothing, which of course implies full maturity.  This is one of the strongest texts in the Bible teaching that the Protestant position is correct and the position of the Council of Trent is in error.  (For other texts teaching the same see Matthew 4:4; 15:1-9; Ecclesiates 12:13, 14; Matthew 28:19, 20, Deuteronomy 4:2 and Revelation 22:18, 19.)

Ellen White wrote, “The very beginning of the great apostasy was in seeking to supplement the authority of God by that of the church. Rome began by enjoining what God had not forbidden, and she ended by forbidding what He had explicitly enjoined.”  The Great Controversy, 289, 290.  This is always the end-result of any church adding any moral duty to what God has given.  So-called “apostolic tradition” has resulted in doctrines that are contradictions to what the apostles actually wrote.  It was for this reason that the Protestant reformers rejected “apostolic tradition,” and all other tradition, except that found in the inspired Word of God.

A second condemnation by the Council of Trent had to do with what writings should compose, or be a part of, the Bible.  This is a very important subject for any Protestant to understand.  Since the foundation of the Protestant faith is the Bible and the Bible alone, any change that is made, either in the translation of the Bible or in the text of the Bible or in what writings compose the Bible, becomes extremely important.  It was for this very reason that the Protestants had been studying Greek and Hebrew and were publishing the New Testament in Greek from the language in which it was originally written.  And it was for this very reason that the various editions of this Greek New Testament had been edited and corrected, over and over again, to obtain the most accurate New Testament possible.  It was for very similar reasons that the Protestant reformers rejected the apocrypha as being part of the Old Testament.  But the Council of Trent condemned the Protestant doctrine that certain books accepted as canonical (as part of the Scriptures) in the Latin Vulgate were apocryphal and not canonical.  One of the results of this was, and is, a difference in Bibles—before the Protestant Reformation there was only one Bible, but since the Protestant Reformation there have been “Catholic Bibles” and “Protestant Bibles.”  One of the principle differences between Catholic and Protestant Bibles is that Protestant Bibles do not contain the apocrypha in the Old Testament, but Catholic Bibles do.

to be continued . . .