with EVERYTHING in the Fathers, then YOU SHOULDN'T QUOTE THEM.
Well, I think that's problematic.
There is NO COMMUNION that agrees with everything in the Fathers. And that's not surprising, is it?
But there is a rather tiresome tendency on the part of some to insist that Lutherans just have no business with them at all, and that when we point out what they say, we are invariably "taking them out of context" - by which they mean more than ignoring the context of a given writing, but instead ignoring the context of the Fathers' lives. The assumption of these folks is that the Fathers were Orthodox or Catholic (in the sense of what those jurisdictions currently teach).
But that is to assume a priori what the very appeal to the Father's writings was intended to examine. When the Lutherans read the Fathers they heard and saw in them things that didn't actually FIT with the teaching and practice of the Roman Church in their day. They found at many points the Fathers could be witnesses to an understanding of the Sacred Scriptures that could correct and help renew the Church, and which they recognized as utterly congruent with the conclusions they had themselves drawn from Scripture.
As a Lutheran I do not grant the premise that "we are NOT the Church of the Fathers." Rather, the exact opposite. We regard St. Augustine as a father in the faith, so too St. John Chrysostom, so too St. Irenaeus, and so on and on. And here's the key: we treat them no differently than we treat Dr. Luther or Dr. Walther. Do we subscribe to everything Luther said about anything? Was he never wrong? No, of course not!
I've been hammered for inviting personal judgment, but I'll risk it yet one more time. Folks, don't buy into the Roman or Orthodox assumption that the Fathers are THEIRS. Do some reading on your own. You'll find some odd things; some things you wonder how they could have thought that; and some things that will delight and amaze you. They are not infallible and they never pretend to be and surprise, surprise! They even tell you to disregard what they say if they don't show you what they teach from the Scripture. Fancy that!
I've personally read from them every day for years; they've done anything but persuade me that the Orthodox and Rome have the corner on them. I think that just as the Lutheran Church is strengthened by learning from them, so too the Roman and Orthodox Christian would be. And all of them will find things that they disagree with, but pondering over what the Fathers pass on is a profitable exercise for any Christian. Sasse: "A Church without patristics is just a sect." Amen!
P.S. If you're Roman or Orthodox, you REALLY don't need to write to tell me how I've got this all wrong. We already know you think that. :)
20 comments:
This does not address your point directly but, knowing that there is not total unanimity in what the Fathers say, and, what the Lutheran fathers say, as you point out clearly I am not hindered from reading from the Fathers.
I had not read much from the Fathers until beginning only recently, maybe 2,3, or 4 years ago. Then I heard "Lutheran" voices saying that I could not read from the Fathers (I think I had permission to read only Reformation and Post-Reformation-Enlightenment theology. This was discouraging. So I was being told that I could not read what I had not read. Well, I am wiser for the wear and tear. I now read from the Church Fathers and from the Medieval theologians/Fathers (after all, for 15-20 years all I had been reading were Reformation theologians).
If this makes me less than Lutheran then I will secretly read, and study and learn by God's grace through faith in Christ. (I do not buy into the Scripture/Apostles skip to Reformation skip to my heart theology/ today's Lutheran theology timeline of learning.) Having said this I confess to not being more Lutheran or even more learned than others. It is counter-productive to tell Lutherans they cannot read from the Fathers or theologians outside of the Reformation. By that criteria then Luther and the Confessions were not "Lutheran."
Fr. May,
I'd say it makes you BE Lutheran! And yes, yes, yes to the Medieval writers too. That's an area where I am still a babe in the woods. So much to learn there. I have read much of Thomas and was surprised to find that I actually enjoyed it (once you got used to the format). I really want to read Hugh of St. Victor because Sasse references him so often, but I've not come across much of his stuff in English.
In my discussions I have found that the disagreement over who the Fathers belong to is really a false issue. I personally think the issue is over how the Fathers are used.
Lutherans use the Fathers, accepting some things while rejecting others.
The Orthodox try to embody the spirit of the Fathers, relying upon Holy Tradition to be a corrective and unifier.
The Roman Church uses them, too, but under a Tridentine categorical system.
Just a thought.
Yeah, yeah, it's dreary, isn't it?
"We believe what the fathers taught."
"Well, what about that father there."
"Well, not him, of course, these fathers over here."
"Yeah, but that father said this."
"You've taken that father out of context."
"But here he is in context."
"Well, yeah, but that father was wrong when he taught that."
"But if your claim to truth is that your faith is the 'faith once given to the church,' because it is what the fathers taught, then what standard to you use to judge that what one of the father's taught is part of that ancient faith or contrary to that ancient faith?"
Well, it becomes pretty easy to say that your church teaches 'the faith once delivered to the saints' when you tautologically define that faith to be "what is consistent with what my church teaches today."
I had the luxury of reading the early fathers "naively." Listening to them for what they taught me from the Scriptures (as I would any other pastor or theologian), but also interacting with them as a good Acts-type Berean (not in a challenging way, but in the sense of a conversation with the texts).
I found them immensely profitable. And still do. It's too bad that, although understandable I suppose, that on every side, there are those who would seek to keep them away from the honest Christian reader.
I would argue that the spirit of the fathers is precisely humility toward God, trust in His promises, and love and service to the neighbor (particularly toward the poor). Such is the calling of all the baptized.
What we shouldn't do is quote any Father in support of something we'd know he didn't actually believe in if we had read the rest of his works. We also should not quote a Father in support of any doctrine that his life demonstrates he didn't hold. IOW, we should read a given Father extensively and learn about his life before we suppose he taught this or that.
See my blog entry of a year ago at:
http://anastasias-corner.blogspot.com/2008/03/fathers-of-church-were.html
Anastasia,
I certainly agree that we should not quote a Father in support of something the Father did not in fact teach; but we learn what the Father taught from his writings, and not from assumptions about how he has to agree with current practices.
I grew up in the LCMS, and deviated to the Romans in high school and college because they seemed to have what I was missing: Word, Sacraments, Liturgy, History (in the sense of the Fathers and the early church). What a happy day when I found that there were confessional Lutherans...all those things PLUS sound theology! (And a testament to the LCMS that "liturgy lite" is nothing but a disservice.)
I know the point of view you describe well. It used to be mine. I remember, when I bought my first Patristic book, a complilation of seven major early works edited by a Protestant, thinking "How could anyone read these Catholic writers and not be or become Catholic?"
Pr Weedon:
Hugh of St Victor's theology rests on his understanding of Augustine of Hippo with a bit of Ps-Dionysian mysticism. Hugh's work played a pivotal role early scholasticism also. Peter Lombard borrowed much from Hugh when he wrote the Sentences. Hugh's major works are available in English.
Dr. Phillips,
Sasse seemed quite intrigued by the way he developed a doctrine of sacraments without laying down a definition first to which they had to conform. Any comments on that?
I would need to go back and read Hugh's work on the Sacraments. However, I would guess that he used an Augustinian definition, "a sacrament is a sacred sign of an invisible grace." Remember there was no magic number of 7 sacraments before the 12th century. Hugh played a role in refining that concept. Peter Lombard whittled it down to 7 in his Sentences.
Remember the Victorines were Augustinian canons in the middle of the growing theological school of Paris.
So why would one accept some things the Church Fathers write and reject others?
Maybe, because not everything that the Church Fathers have written is in agreement with Sacred Scripture - although I would write that the vast majority is.
It is a good principle to follow.
Jon, I agree about the Scriptures. What concerns me about our opinion is that we then become the arbiter of what the Scriptures are saying. I'm not sure how to get around that. If we are the arbiter, in the end, what's the point of reading the Fathers anyway? I sometimes wonder if I'm only providing a Christianized version of Caliph Omar's statement about the Quran, "Burn the libraries; for their value is in this book." Am I to learn from the Fathers -- or judge them? I'm not sure how to answer this.
We should not read the Fathers to judge them, but students always judge the teachings of the people they learn from. It's a necessity in a sinful world. In fact, I teach my own people at my congregation not to believe something merely because I said it - but does it coincide with what the Scriptures teach? If they don't see how it connects, or if they doubt what I say, they should challenge me and demand that I prove it on the basis of Scripture.
The thing is, if I see a point in Father X that I think is shaky, I can't ask him to explain further. So, I take what makes sense as being in-line with Scripture, I learn from the insights, and I go without remorse.
Of course, part of this is the idea that the Fathers are my colleagues, not my masters. I will take what they say under advisement (and most often with great joy), but I will not wring my hands if I disagree with a point because they would on occasion disagree with each other and take differing approaches. Thus is life.
Scripture, tradition (the fathers and their legacy), and reason was the threefold rule of faith laid out by Bishop Jewel during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. This has been the source of many controversies in the Anglican Communion. Many have tried to make this three legged stool, a chair with legs of equal lengths. In other words, many have assumed that each of three points in his assertion carry their own equal authority. This was never Jewel’s intention or position, quite the opposite. Jewel, like Luther, understood that tradition and reason are not, and never will be on the same plane as the holy and perfect scriptures. In fact, they many times the traditions have contradicted each other. Case and point, the early church fathers were almost all historic pre-millenarians, while the later fathers were a-millenarian. This simply fact goes to show us that tradition and reason are not infallibly attended by the Holy Spirit. However, that does not mean that they are not attended at all.
The Spirit is present within tradition and reason, and we can tell that this is the case when both illumine, uphold, and teach us the meaning of the words of scripture. The hardship that this places upon the present church is that we cannot rest on our laurels and just go with what the Fathers said. Every generation must wrestle with the word of God; yes it is a great benefit to read the fathers and their teachings, however, we must also compare one father to another, pray for the attendance of the Spirit to illumine the meaning of its content, and we are to do this as a community that properly understands that tradition and reason are the tools that are given to us so that we might grow in our understanding and practice of the faith. The proper use of tradition according to Jewel is to be a correcting factor to our innovations, and to force us to a more mature interpretation of scripture due to the problems it leaves to us.
The fundagelicals see no use in tradition, and therefore they are impoverished beyond belief. The Roman church sees the church Fathers authority as license to speak infallibly, and Byzantine look to the Fathers as though all has been extracted from the revelation of God infallibly. The difference between those views and that of “Reformation Catholics -Orthodox Anglicans and Lutherans” is that we stand on the shoulders of these giants to look out at the landscape. We understand that the fathers are a gift to us that helps us to interpret the word, to ground us in what has already been discovered, and to move us along the road of careful thought. Scripture, tradition, and reason, all have their place if properly employed, and each can be disastrous if taken out of balance.
What a happy day when I found that there were confessional Lutherans...all those things PLUS sound theology! (And a testament to the LCMS that "liturgy lite" is nothing but a disservice.)
Right you are, Angela! I sojourned for a while in Rome, too, but swam back out of the Tiber and am gratefully home in the LCMS. We really are blessed as Confessional Lutherans.
Christine
Your problem is not that You don't agree with everything, but that You don't agree with almost anything in the Fathers.
Lucian,
That statement, my friend, is a false witness. I agree with very much indeed in the Fathers.
Yes, I know You do. (You're a Lutheran). But it still fails short on so many, many levels.
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