Article VI: Of the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation

Before God and before Christ Jesus who is to the judge the living and the dead, I charge you solemnly by his coming appearance and his reign, proclaim the message, press it home in season and out of season, use argument, reproof, and appeal, with all the patience that teaching requires. For the time will come when people will not stand sound teaching , but each will follow his own whim and gather a crowd of teachers to his fancy. They will stop their ears to the truth and turn to fables (mythous) But you must keep your head whatever happens; put up with hardship, work to spread the gospel, discharge all the duties of your calling (2 Timothy 4:1-5).

I've been seeing these words a lot lately, dispersed in bits and pieces amongst the cluttering and clucking of many virtual tongues. It is a word spoken to many against their enemies. I wish to speak of it among friends. This is Paul's farewell address to Timothy, a distillation of the call to Timothy as a teacher of the Gospel. Paul reminds him first that the obligation of such teachers is ultimately to Almighty God who will hold all teachers responsible for their teaching. "At the watchmen's hand..." says Ezekiel and Augustine answered likewise in City of God .

Second, Paul calls Timothy to proclaim "the message, press it home in season and out of season." The Gospel should be proclaimed when fashionable and unfashionable. God has appointed no acceptable time for its proclamation to stop, therefore it must be human beings who are saying some words of Christ are seasonable or unseasonable.

Third, Paul discourses on methods: "argument, reproof, and appeal." The first is primarily founded on reason, the second on the evilness of a world assaulted by principalities, powers, and pettier but no less horrid inhumanities of man to man, and the third on the hope of freedom from the lusts of the flesh and the warfare of the cosmic order only known in the requital of the love of God and reconcilation to him through Jesus Christ. But Paul chides, "Be patient..."

Fourth, Paul warns that it will not be easy. In future, human beings will choose their teachers of the Gospel, and they will pick based on what they want to hear. This idea is so useful for polemic, but I see it also as a call to Timothy. What will differentiate a Timothy obedient to Paul from the competition is the preaching of the truth rather than mythos . Mythos is a funny word in that it can mean a true story as well as a false one. But given the context, Paul's sense of mythos is one very familiar to modern and ancient man. Mythoi are things we know are not truth, but we teach and profess them anyway because we think they are better or easier to take or more advantageous to ourselves and others. They are no substitute for the truth. John Chrysostom argues otherwise somewhat convincingly in On the Priesthood , but he likely would not want the Gospel seen this way. Whatever the distinctions or uses of truth and falsehood, the Good News of God in Christ is an abomination if it is merely a little white lie (or made up of them). Many important matters of human life, as Chrysostom agrees, are better proclaimed as the truth when they are truth.

And so, Timothy is charged to keep cool and persevere so that the Gospel remains true and not a series of placebos. If there is an interpretive community for the Holy Scriptures (and though I have spoken of it I wish to inquire further), Paul's charge remains in force.

What distances us from the Articulators in the matter of the Holy Scriptures is that some of the interpretive community has been very good at busting myths over the last three centuries. We no longer take so much for granted about how the text was assembled, having learned to speak about J and Deutero-Pauline whatnot. I still am working through how the Church before the Reformation did not understand the Scriptures as some pure text revealed by God in plain meaning, but I do not think the Fathers would be particularly appreciative to learn how good their instincts were. But despite the mess of what the Scriptures are, Christ was able to reveal himself in their letters (suggesting in the process how much mess there really was). Whatever ahistoricity, critical compilation, and contradictions "pollute the text," I believe there was a historical man and historical acts that purify and harmonize them. There was a Son of God, very man and very God, who speaks to my condition (hat tip to George Fox). That God-Man and man of history, I believe are one and the same. All of that messiness came and comes together because of Him. Most of all, I realize that the full fruition of the Holy Scriptures has not yet come, for God is not yet all in all. Therefore, keep your heads, the Scriptures still may be fulfilled in your hearing!

Paul's charge to Timothy also is instructive in that it represents the continuation of a tradition. On one hand, Timothy stands in the same place as the captains of hundreds and of thousands in Exodus who were to settle easy disputes and leave the hard judgments to Moses, the Prophet of God. Paul can fulfill this Mosaic function, because he sees himself as apostle at-large but also because he, like Moses, is on a transformational journey spurred by theophany. The Burning Bush for Moses, the Vision on the Damascus Road for Paul, the Life, Death, Resurrection of Jesus and the Pentecost for the other apostles are theophanic moments that must provide some confidence for those difficult cases. Those who see such things must throw away the idea that they will be like Aaron and lead the people into idolatry. The apostles, like many of their great forefathers among the Israelites, were almost direct conduits to God. On the other hand, this is Paul's farewell. The apostolic age is slowly drawing to a close. More definitely, the tradition bequeathed to Timothy could be called scribal or Levitical in the context of the Temple and rabbinical in the context of the synagogue.

The Book of Ezra is first to describe this role and what we know as the interpretive act. The Law has been restored to Judah after the return of some to Jerusalem and the rebuilding of the Temple. The Book of Nehemiah explains how it might have happened. The returnees are all settled and ask that the scribe and priest Ezra "bring the the book of the Law of Moses, which the Lord had enjoined upon Israel." Convicted of the offenses of their fathers and longing to be obedient so as to avoid their fate, they ask to hear the rules. From what I can tell, Ezra read the scroll of the Law ritually in the midst of a large crowd, while some among the Levites were scattered amidst the crowd reading as well and "made its sense plain, and gave instruction in what was read." Hmmm...Law needs interpretation. But the Book of Ezra records a possible result of this episode. Someone noticed the endogamy rules. Unfortunately, many people had taken foreign wives, including some very prominent people. It was decided that such people should abandon their wives and children. (Our sympathetic hearts are not assuaged. There is no talk of support payments and such, though notions of such things do exist in the Torah in other contexts.)

The interpretation entered in the story when the priests who had offended not only dismissed their foreign families but also offered a ram in expiation. Now there is no precedent in the Law for such a penalty. They as easily could have been deprived of their status and enrolled in another tribe. But it seems an interpretation of some sort was made. One possibility is that Ezra and his fellow interpreters saw the offense as desanctifying (as I suggest by implication) and offer a ram as a re-ordination sacrifice, since both Exodus and Leviticus state that a ram sacrifice is necessary for this ritual. Another possibility is that the interpreters recognized the offense as unintentional (as it might have been due to ignorance of the Law) and ordered that the priests at least should make the offering prescribed by Leviticus for unintentional offenses. But clearly Ezra and company went beyond the letter of the Law.

It might be argued against me that 1 Samuel 21 contains the first interpretive moment. But I think Ezra and Nehemiah are the clearest cases, because they show a community wrestling with a text. All of the earlier possible interpretive moments lack the clear presence of community approbation and a text. But whatever interpretive moments there are in the Old Testament, interpretation appears to be the business of prophets, priests, and kings, people like Timothy delegated in one way or another as set apart from the people.

Of course, as Christians, we must recognize ourselves as prophets, priests, and kings through Baptism. In the Old Testament, many of these figures also were direct conduits to God, not just interpreters of texts. The role of the Holy Spirit in Scriptural interpretation is part of a grand tradition of prophets, priests, and kings in the Old Testament. For it was often said of these men and women that the Spirit of God was with them.

Most instructive to us should be the case of Peter, who interprets the Scriptures in marvelous, Christ-affirming, and practical ways in the Acts of the Apostles. Prophet, priest, and king? Yes. Servant and Shepherd? Yes. But remember that the religious authorities of Jerusalem saw him as "an untutored layman." The Church is a kingdom of priests drawn from every class of people into which human beings have divided ourselves. The tasks of interpretation and proclamation bequeathed to Timothy and others like him surely belong to us all. But still we are merely human and there is something of the wanderer in the Wilderness of Sin about us. One of the great works of the Church since the Resurrection has been to determine how a kingdom of priests can work together to interpret and proclaim the truth rather than mythoi . Article VI presents one view. I will present another view contemporary with it.

Article VI: Of the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation

Holy Scriptures containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation. In the name of Holy Scripture, we do understand those Canonical books of the Old and New testament, of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church.
Of the names and number of the Canonical Books.
Genesis.
Exodus.
Leviticus.
Numbers.
Deuteronomy.
Joshua.
Judges.
Ruth.
The First Book of Samuel.
The Second Book of Samuel.
The First Book of Kings.
The Second Book of Kings.
The First Book of Chronicles.
The Second Book of Chronicles.
The First Book of Esdras.
The Second Book of Esdras.
The Book of Esther.
The Book of Job.
The Psalms.
The Proverbs.
Ecclesiastes, or the Preacher.
Cantica, or Songs of Solomon.
Four Prophets the Greater.
Twelve Prophets the Less.
And the other books (as Hierome saith) the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine; such are these following:
The Third Book of Esdras.
The Fourth Book of Esdras.
The Book of Tobias.
The Book of Judith.
The rest of the Book of Esther.
The Book of Wisdom.
Jesus the Son of Sirach.
Baruch the Prophet.
The Song of the Three Children.
The Story of Susanna.
Of Bel and the Dragon.
The Prayer of Manasses.
The First Book of Maccabees.
The Second Book of Maccabees.
All the books of the New Testament, as they are commonly received, we do receive, and account them canonical.

The listing of books is especially interesting and suggests that this Article and the next one are replies to a purported "Ecumenical Council" held in the City of Trent about the same time. I submit for your consideration the relevant portion of its Acts.

See Council of Trent: Fourth Session

The listing of books is hierarchical for reasons we Anglicans attribute to St. Jerome (Hierome of the Article). Essentially, the Council of Trent was the first to set a Canon of Scripture with a lot of hemming and hawing about penalties and so forth. The Articulators seem to have replied that even Jerome (the translator of the Vulgate edition mentioned in the Tridentine decree) said certain books weren't to be considered sources of doctrine (and yet were used). If anyone knows where he said that, I'd appreciate a citation, but I'll trust the Articulators.

What interests me more is the different hermeneutical and soteriological implications of Article VI and the Tridentine decree.

Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall,--in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, --wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church,--whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures,--hath held and doth hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never (intended) to be at any time published. Contraveners shall be made known by their Ordinaries, and be punished with the penalties by law established.

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One result of the hermeneutical approach implied above is that the battle between Galileo and the Church wasn't about Science vs the Scriptures. Instead, Galileo was convinced that (a) nature and the Scriptures were in full agreement, (b) if they didn't appear that way, it was due to bad interpretation, and (c) Galileo had found some of those good interpretations. Such an approach apparently had support in Augustine and Bonaventure. But none of this mattered. Galileo relied on his own skill and interpreted the Scriptures against the unanimous consent of the Fathers, who apparently were all ardent promoters of the Ptolemaic system.

The approach of Article VI is somewhat different. It speaks to the abuses many saw in the Church of Rome. People were told such things as "salvation consists in total obedience to the will of the Roman pontiff" or "there's this Purgatory place but if you give alms and say prayers, you'll get to heaven that much faster" or "both the bread and the wine contain the Body and Blood of Christ." Article VI, I think arose, because it became very hard to see the interpretation of the Fathers for the opinions of the Fathers and harder still to see what present Catholic practice had to do with the words of the Scriptures. In some cases, this was an attack on ecclesiastical wealth. In other cases, it was an attack on plain ecclesiastical confusion. In yet other cases, it seems to have come down to soteriological worry. In cases such as Henry VIII's annulment case against Catherine of Aragon, Holy Mother Church seemed to become a wholly fallible institution, wont to change their interpretation of the Scriptures depending on whose army was marching on the Pope or what Cardinal was in England. Rome appeared to ply mythoi . How could anyone know the way to salvation presently taught wasn't a mythos ?

Article VI seems to say, if you want to know what is necessary to salvation, we are quite certain that is all in here somewhere. You don't need to do anything you don't see here. "Required of any man" personalizes it. But the Article does not answer the all-important question of who is reading and who is proving. Nor do we see any standard for proof.

In all honesty, I object to both the approach at Trent and in Article VI. I told you before that if the Church never dieth and God is the God of the living and the dead, I was going to believe that the entire communion of saints interprets the Holy Scriptures as a single Body whereof Christ is the Head. I object to Trent because it regards the contemporary and ordinary man as dead, unable to say anything against Holy Mother Church or the unanimous consent of the Fathers (whatever that is). I object to Article VI because it seems to respond to Trent but does not admit the Fathers to be alive and capable of argument. Now it is possible that Anglicanism is not condemned to poverty, that the inheritance in reasoning and holy example given to us by those who are now "a great cloud of witnesses" is not explicitly shoved away by Article VI. The authority of Jerome, for instance, is admitted. But in an age when intelligent, conscientious, and faithful people see the shadows of plots in ancient councils and see orthodox Christology at odds with the Scriptures, it would be useful to feel justified within this part of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church to point to the reasoning and example of those witnesses and say, "What did they miss? What better framework can you provide?" To others, I long to give answers on different questions infused not only by Scripture but also by Tradition. May I do this? Or will this age of itching ears say, "We will hear nothing unless it be the plain meaning of the Scriptures. And we don't want to hear we have the grammar wrong either..."?
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Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you may not weep at the words of the Holy Scriptures, but having heard them feast on that Most Rich Food and Sweet Drink that is the Body and Blood of Him wherein we have life and liberty.