Catholicism versus Protestantism down the centuries

Full circle again. What does it mean to obey the Father? To do what he wants you to do. Do you obey traffic lights? Chances are you do because it's the sensible thing to do, to avoid crashing into other drivers. The fact that it's the law is incidental. You're not actually "obeying the law"; you're obeying common sense.

I think you are making the same mistake that the Dispensationalists make. Namely focusing in on a portion of scripture that you like to the exclusion of everything else Jesus said.Yes it is important to note that faith is not just a state or condition of mind, but to take it that faith has nothing to do with mental state is clearly to do just as much violence to the text.If action and works were enough, then surely a better word than faith could easily be found to say that.

I already answered this in Message 75 of the What Is A True Christian thread. It is clearly spelled out in scripture only it didn't become a huge issue until the Reformation when Luther and the other Reformers recognized that the RCC was teaching a salvation based on works that violates the scriptural message. The works doctrine was so ingrained in Luther it took him quite a while to see through it and get free of it personally.It is in Romans that Paul spells out the doctrine of justification by faith, justification being a free gift that cannot be earned: And the term "propitiation" is also in scripture, showing that Jesus Himself is our propitiation, is the payment of our sins to God in Himself. We can't pay for them, He has paid for them: False history. The Reformation emphasized scriptural doctrine in order to set people free from the false doctrine of the RCC which was not based on scripture. The Counter Reformation may have brought about a few reforms in the RCC but there is no comparison between it and the Reformation otherwise, as the RCC went on to condemn in their Council of Trent the central teachings of the Reformation about justification by faith (and just as a side note the Jesuits set themselves up as instruments of the Counter Reformation to try to destroy the nations based on Protestantism too in the hope of reinstating RCC rule over the world and bringing back the Inquisition. They've pretty much succeeded unfortunately.) More false history. "Works" simply means righteous deeds of all kinds. Luther wasn't suffering as a monk from his inability to practice the Jewish mitzvot, he was suffering from the awareness that he could never be righteous enough in a general sense to please God, so that if salvation depended on his own righteousness he knew he was doomed. He drove his confessor crazy bringing long lists of his sins to confess in the effort to be cleared of them. The "Protestant interpretation" was DERIVED from Paul's writings. They are quite clear. There were all kinds of different problems in the early Church and in different periods of the Church, which brought out different emphases in scripture. The Reformation focused on justification by faith which is clearly presented by Paul.It was also presented by Augustine by the way, one of the early Church fathers. He wasn't always consistent but the doctrine is there and Luther made use of it. None of this invalidates the basic fact that SALVATION is a free gift to us by God's grace alone through faith (also a gift of God) alone in Christ alone. Good deeds are what we are saved FOR, they are not the basis of our salvation. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : correct codeEdited by Faith, : No reason given.

Let's fix that: There. 'Free gift', 'grace alone', 'faith alone' are catchphrases of your tribe. They do not appear in the scriptures you claim to revere.You are not discussing history. This is a creed statement. No, 'works' means what the writers meant to say. One must respect the text.They said 'works of the law'. The problem facing the writers was how to integrate converts from very different cultures into one community. The issue at hand was whether the Gentile believers should adopt Jewish practices mandated by the Torah. We find frequent mention of circumcision in particular.That's history.You show little interest in Christian history. You spout creed. Exactly. Yeshua, his disciples and the early Christians operated within an ancient and mostly Jewish frame of reference. They weren't trying to solve the guilt issues of a fifteenth-century German monk.You seem to be reasoning that if Luther needs an ancient text to mean something, the text is obligated somehow to mean that. Such an approach is unhistorical and anachronistic by definition. And the word Eucharist was derived by early Christians from the Gospels.Shall we judge your tribe's traditions as you have judged others? It will look great in 3D. Antonio Banderas, please, for Saint Ignatius of Loyola.

This is a good time to begin examining the ways myth and history differ.--Mythical time tends to be circular. The narratives are pattern-based. They show structures like this:A B A'A B C B' A'The first, ABA, is the essential outline of the Golden Age myth. Times were golden, times were dark, times are golden again.The second, ABCBA, is one way that form might be developed. Once could tell a story in which times were golden, golden forces fought dark forces, times were dark, golden forces are fighting dark forces again, times are again golden.Circular structures appeal to our species for a variety of reasons.--History is linear. It follows time. It is event-based, not pattern-based. It yields structures like this:A B C D E F G H I J K...Notice that, unlike myth, historical narrative is open-ended. There is no assumption of an inevitable return.--Both forms are simple at bottom, yet the structures are very different.History works like science. One collects facts, plots those facts on a graph (time in this case), and looks for any patterns that emerge. The goal is to understand actual events.Myth works like art. The pattern is already there. To the extent that one takes notice of facts at all, one uses artistic license. One cherry-picks facts that contribute to the desired shape. Anything that skews the shape is left out. The goal is to experience pattern itself.History--fact--shows us that we never put a foot into the same river twice. In myth it happens all the time. Mythical rivers can work this way precisely because they are not factual rivers. They are symbols.Some people, schooled in the myths of their tribe, recite those myths and call it 'history'. But little need exists for such confusion. History and myth are very different in function and form. Great mischief follows when we ask one form of narrative do the work of the other.___Edited by Archer Opteryx, : expansion of detailEdited by Archer Opteryx, : typo cleanup

How very odd. I'd just quoted scripture using the term "free gift..." ...and in context all the scripture I quoted make it very clear that grace alone and faith alone mean without works by which no one can be justified.Again, the only mythmaker here is you.Oh, and "works of the law" in every conceivable context means every kind of righteousness. The Law, after all, includes the Moral Law.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

If you used that term, you did not quote scripture at all. The phrase 'free gift' does not appear in the original text. It was inserted by King James's translators.0 for 3. Faith fails again.And as an aside, Faith: an honest interpreter would have mentioned that detail herself. The insertion is indicated as such in most copies of the KJV, and other English translations in common use lack the phrase. You surely noticed. (ahem)---Faith's latest failure provides yet another example of the difference between myth and history.In Faith's tribe, the myth is that Protestantism--in some mystical magical fashion--existed 15 centuries before the movement actually began. The tribe's adherents like to think their founders were not making a break but restoring a lost Golden Age. The myth gives the cause more of a glow. It also helps disguise the awkward reality that other traditions are much older.So it is that Faith sees the redundant Protestant catchphrase 'free gift' in her 1611 translation and doesn't ask too many questions about how it got there. The original author of the ancient text didn't say that. But the translators' calendar has a tale to tell.- In 1517 Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to a door in Germany to launch the Reformation.- In 1611 King James's Protestant translators inserted 'free gift' into their rendering of ancient Christian documents.Voil._____Edited by Archer Opteryx, : clarityEdited by Archer Opteryx, : clarity

I find that hard to swallow: did Anakin die for nothing?

How very very very odd. Here's a list of other Bible translations for Romans 5:16 and seven of them have "free gift." The others all have at least "gift:" Romans 5:16And for Romans 5:18 where the KJV did insert the words "free gift" so did three others, because it's obviously correct in context and the other translations convey the same meaning in different words: Romans 5:18

Irrelevant. The observation stands: the catchphrases you declare indispensable in defining 'true Christianity'--'free gift', 'grace alone', 'faith alone'--are phrases the early Christians easily lived without, if their writings in the canon offer any indication. The pet phrases are just not there.You now want to retreat to a spot where we debate whether using any of these non-canon catchphrases might still be 'OK'. It's irrelevant to the topic. We are not debating theology. The subject is history. We are discussing what actually happened.What actually happened is that the early Christians didn't talk like you. The record they left does not contain your favourite shibboleths. They were not Protestants.Your verbal formulas are the product of a later age's controversies, hangups, and battles.

Interesting.From what I can gather you're telling us that those phrases did not occurr in the 'original 'copies, but were added later, for example during and after the reformation?Is my interpretation of what you wrote correct?

The term "free gift" is a direct translation from the Greek in the Concordance for Romans 5:16.I proved you wrong twice but you just go on pretending it didn't happen. Amazing.Since it's in the Bible Greek the idea that they used different language is ridiculous. If they thought they contributed anything to their salvation rather than trusting completely in God for it, they weren't saved. And as I said, Augustine also made the same point.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

You keep assuming that I talk in absolutes. You assume I mean "nothing" when I don't say "nothing". I have not said that faith has "nothing" to do with mental state. I have said that the mental state of faith has no value. Of course. Other words were used. We have to temper the use of the word "faith" based on what else was said.

I have no idea what you mean by that statement. I understand that. And what you say is not in accordance with Jesus own words. You are doing exactly the same kind of cherry picking that Faith is doing.

So you claim. You'll have to be more specific.