St Thomas More, King Henry VIII and Luther
The following is from a post to The Mohican Board (Bumppo's Redux!) SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION
The portion in blue font was published in "Annals Australasia", May 2000.A very good refutation of Luther's sola scriptura idea is St. Thomas More's 1523 response to Luther's tract against Henry VIII.
"... if as you consistently affirm, all extrascriptural matter is to be maintained only freely and none of it held fast by faith, what is the meaning of this Apostolic admonition: "Stand and hold fast the traditions which you have learned through our word and letter"? [2 Thess 2:15] The preservation of both word and letter is equally charged by the Apostle. Extrascriptural matter was thus handed down, and on a binding, not a take-it-or-leave-it basis! What do you say to that, Luther? And to this: 'Many things were done which are not written in this book,' a passage of the Evangelist's? [John 20:30] These things which you have remarked as absent from the other scriptural books also, and of which John says that the whole world cannot contain them; aren't they to be regarded as miracles at least? Wouldn't you also find that an ignorance of many of them would jeopardize faith? ...
"What force has this pronouncement of Christ's: 'The Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, when He comes, will guide you into all truth'? [John 16:13] He doesn't say that the Spirit will 'write' to you or whisper in your ear, but he will lead you, will form you interiorly, and with His breath will show your hearts the way to all truth. Was it the Apostles, here addressed by Christ, to whom the way was to be shown? Were they alone told, 'I am with you to the consummation of the world'? [Matt 28:20] Who can question the direction of this message to the Church? Will not the Holy Spirit show her the way to all truth? Was she not told, 'Go, preach the Gospel to every creature'? [Matt 28:19] Did they read the Gospel or preach it? And did Christ cast the new law in bronze or strike it on stone tablets, commanding that everything else be considered valueless and cast out?
"Can God's own word as set down by the Apostle leave Luther untouched, 'I will put my laws in their hearts; I shall inscribe them on their minds'? [Heb 8:10, 10:16] He makes no mention of stone or wood, for as the old law was stamped by Him upon external stone, so will the new be inscribed with His own finger in the book of the heart; that which existed so briefly upon the hardest material will be made to last forever on the softest. So it has pleased God to show His power. Though the old stone tablets were quickly shattered, the new remain. The word of God will remain forever uneffaced in the heart of man. The heart, the Church of Christ, will forever contain the true Gospel of Christ, written there before any of the Evangelical books. However ingenious the apparent scriptural evidence heretics may bring against the true faith, God has engraved His law in such a way that it is impervious to their guile. The strength of this spring has preserved the faith of Christ against assaults upon both His mother and Himself from their respective enemies, Helvidius and Arius ... it is certain that Christ would not disappoint His Church on the essentials of her faith.
"But if you continue dully to insist upon the written as the only valid form of transmission, and doggedly persist in ignoring the scriptural evidence from the king's book, at least clear up the enigma posed by these facts: the Father is never, at any place in all of Scripture, called 'uncreated,' the Son is never called 'consubstantial,' and the Holy Spirit never clearly described as 'proceeding from the Father and Son.' For truly, the heretics continue to stress the vagueness of all scriptural descriptions of the Holy Spirit so strongly that one can easily say, with St Gregory Nazianzen, that He is 'Theon Agrapton,' the unwritten God. Would you have, then, each individual man, freely and without spiritual hazard, decide for himself whether or not to believe in the Father as uncreated, the Son as consubstantial, and the Holy Spirit as proceeding from both?"
[A poem on the infallible, or supreme conscience, reading of Scripture]
The Well Read Book
Two men were sitting on a bench, each reading his own fare;
The first one glanced a moment first, then he began to stare.
"Pray tell me, sir, if you don't mind," he curiously began,
"Is that the Holy Scripture book you hold there in your hand?"
The second gent replied, "It is," and smiled graciously,
"I study this most reverently; Interpreting's the key."
The questioner then scratched his head, and soon began again.
"Interpreting you say's the key; do tell me, by which man?"
The second gent now grew annoyed and quickly changed his tone.
"I tell you, sir, by any man but save that one in Rome."
The first man felt compelled to ask, "Why you and yet not he?
Do you not grant just for yourself infallibility?"
The second gent was not amused to have this pointed out.
"Don't you know, you foolish man," he now began to shout,
"Fallibility is of no import nor is that man," he said.
"The Holy Spirit helps me read," and calmly shook his head;
"He guides me so that I may see, surely He'll guide you."
"Thank you sir," the other said, "I'm sure He'll guide me true.
God's Holy book's infallible, on that we do agree.
Oh, by the way, that man in Rome--I tell you, he is me."
From The Mohican Board (Bumppo's Redux!) and
From "Annals Australasia" May, 2000
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