Participants: Pr. Stephen Bohr
Series Code: MMJ
Program Code: MMJ000005
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00:37 Shall we bow our heads for prayer?
00:39 Our Father and our God, we thank You so much for the awesome 00:45 privilege of being here to study Your word this day. 00:48 And we ask, Father, that as we open the holy pages 00:53 of Your book, that Your Spirit will be with us to teach us, 00:57 to guide us, and to lead us into all truth. 01:01 And we thank You for hearing our prayer, for we ask it in the 01:04 precious name of Your Son Jesus, Amen. 01:08 Perhaps some of you are wondering how the 01:13 Roman Catholic Church can teach certain doctrines, or dogmas, 01:18 which are not clearly contained in Scripture; 01:22 dogmas such as Mary the mother of God, 01:27 such as the immaculate conception, 01:31 the perpetual virginity of Mary, and the assumption of Mary 01:37 to heaven after her death. 01:39 Perhaps some of you are wondering, How can these 01:42 doctrines be taught if there is nothing in Scripture 01:46 to corroborate these teachings? 01:49 We're going to study in our lecture today the reason why 01:54 Roman Catholicism teaches these doctrines, even though they are 02:00 not contained in Scripture, not even implicitly. 02:05 We have to go back to the times of the Old Testament. 02:09 We have to go, in fact, back to the times of Moses. 02:14 When Moses went up to mount Sinai he received revelations 02:20 from God which he committed to writing. 02:24 And those writings are known as the Pentateuch, 02:28 the first five books of the Bible. 02:30 But according to the concept of the Jews of Christ's day, 02:35 we find that they taught that also God gave to Moses certain 02:41 instructions and teachings which were not committed to writing. 02:46 In other words, there was a deposit of teaching from God 02:51 to Moses which was composed of written material, 02:56 as well as on written traditions, and we could call 03:01 this the deposit of the faith. 03:04 In the second place, the Jews of Christ's day, as well as some 03:09 earlier than this, believed that there had to be a transmitting 03:15 agent to transmit reliably what God had given Moses 03:20 in writing and orally. 03:23 And so they developed the idea that there was a transmitting 03:27 mechanism to transmit the truth from generation to generation 03:34 in unbroken succession. 03:37 I would like to read some statements from scholars 03:41 of the day, as well as scholars of our day, on this idea 03:47 of transmitting the deposit of faith from generation 03:51 to generation in unbroken succession. 03:54 I'd like to begin by reading from Flavius Josephus. 03:59 Josephus was a Jew, of course. 04:02 He was a Pharisee, and he was born in the year 37 A.D., 04:06 which means he was born only six years after the 04:10 crucifixion of Jesus Christ. 04:12 So I suppose he knew quite well the Hebrew, or the Jewish 04:16 concept of tradition in his day and age. 04:20 This is what Josephus had to say: 04:40 I want you to notice the technical terminology: 04:43 passed on, handed down, sayings that Moses had spoken orally, 04:52 which were not recorded in the written law of Moses. 04:56 It's interesting, in the Jewish Talmud, which is a collection 05:01 of the traditions of the Jews, we find these significant words: 05:08 This is found in Aboth 1:1, 2. 05:29 The men of the Great Synagogue are those of the days 05:33 of Ezra and Nehemiah. 05:35 So you'll notice that there was an unbroken succession 05:39 of transmission of what God had given Moses in this concept 05:43 of the days of Christ. 05:44 Moses had given it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, 05:48 the elders to the prophets, the prophets to the 05:51 men of the Great Synagogue. 05:52 And then the final piece was added, which the men of the 05:55 Great Synagogue gave these messages, these traditions, 06:00 to the Rabbinical schools of the days of Christ. 06:03 Now, significantly, Marcel Simon in the book, Jewish Sects, 06:09 has this to say about the statement that I just read 06:13 from the Jewish Talmud: 06:14 It is remarkable that after these words from the Talmud 06:20 of transmission, unbroken transmission, 06:23 comes the enumeration of several pairs of teachers. 06:28 Antiginus of Soco, received the law from Simeon the Just, 06:34 etcetera, whose historical existence is 06:40 more or less certain. 06:42 This list finally ends with Hillel and Shammai, 06:48 famous leaders of schools, that is in the days of Christ. 06:53 So, basically, after the Talmud says that the message of Moses 06:59 was transmitted from Moses to Joshua, 07:03 from Joshua to the elders, from the elders to the prophets, 07:06 from the prophets to the men of the Great Synagogue, 07:08 you have a list of twosomes; in other words one leader, 07:14 transmitted to the next, and transmitted to the next. 07:16 You have a long list of individuals who lived in 07:20 succession, and passed on the information which God had given 07:25 Moses; not only the written, but supposedly also 07:28 the oral revelation which God had given to Moses. 07:32 In other words, there was a type of succession. 07:35 We wouldn't call it apostolic succession, but we would call 07:39 it a succession from one generation to another by passing 07:42 it on from one rabbi, or one scribe to another. 07:46 Now I'd like to read another statement by Marcel Simon. 07:51 He says this: 07:55 That is in the eyes of the Pharisees. 08:10 In other words, the traditions which were shared, 08:13 which supposedly Moses had received orally on Mt. Sinai, 08:17 they were not actually additions to the written Torah. 08:22 They were not actually information that had 08:24 not existed before. 08:36 Which is the written revelation. 08:51 And so you have these scholars, among them Flavius Josephus, 08:55 who say that this deposit of truth, which God had given 09:00 to Moses, both the written books of Moses, and supposedly the 09:04 oral traditions, which God had given to Moses, which had not 09:07 been committed to writing, were transmitted from generation 09:11 to generation, from one scribe, from one religious 09:14 leader to another. 09:16 Perhaps I can read one more statement. 09:19 This one is by George Foot Moore, who wrote two 09:22 volumes called, Judaism. 09:23 This is the standard in the field. He says this: 09:38 So we've noticed two things so far. 09:41 First of all we found that, according to the Jewish concept 09:46 of tradition, there were the writings of Moses, 09:49 and the unwritten revelation, which God had also given Moses 09:54 on Mt. Sinai, which formed a deposit of truth. 09:58 We also noticed secondly, that there was a process of 10:02 transmission from generation to generation, supposedly in 10:06 unbroken succession from one scholar, from one Rabbi, 10:10 or one teacher to another. 10:11 But there's a third element in this concept, 10:15 and that is that in every age there needed to be a living 10:20 interpreter of the tradition which had been passed on. 10:24 In other words, there had to be, we might call a magisterium, 10:29 which would bring forth only that which Moses 10:34 had supposedly spoken, and only what was contained 10:39 in the tradition itself, according to this concept. 10:42 Now this is what is meant in Matthew 23:1, 2 where Jesus is 10:49 indicting the scribes and the Pharisees. 10:51 He says this in Matthew 23:1, 2: Then Jesus spoke to the 10:56 multitudes, and to His disciples saying,... 11:00 Now notice this: The scribes and the Pharisees sit 11:04 sit in Moses' seat. 11:08 The word seat there is the word cathedra. 11:11 It could be translated throne, because it's translated that way 11:16 in other places in the New Testament. 11:17 In other words the scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses' 11:21 throne, or on Moses' seat. 11:23 Now what does this mean that they sat on Moses seat? 11:26 The Roman Catholic Commentary, the Jerome Bible Commentary, 11:31 explains what Moses' seat means. 11:35 Notice the statement: 12:03 And, of course, the author of this article is saying: 12:12 In other words, sitting on Moses' seat meant that the 12:16 Pharisees were the living interpreters of what Moses 12:20 had passed on from generation to generation. 12:23 They were the ones who said if a tradition was genuine or not. 12:27 They could bring forth teachings which, supposedly, Moses had 12:32 spoken of, but had not been brought forth yet from the 12:36 deposit of unwritten traditions. 12:38 In other words, they had the authority to say what was a 12:41 genuine tradition, and was not a genuine tradition. 12:46 According to Simon, and I read once again: The transmission of 12:52 oral tradition, that's the things that were not 12:55 written by Moses, made Phariseeism the living element 13:01 of official Judaism. 13:04 It was the tradition that allowed the Pharisees to justify 13:09 all the elaborations that they introduced regarding the 13:13 Scriptural precepts on the level of observances as well as 13:18 on the level of doctrine. 13:20 So whenever they brought forth a teaching that was not 13:23 contained in the writings of Moses, they would say, 13:26 We have the authority to say that this belongs to the 13:29 written tradition that was handed down by Moses. 13:31 And thus they could bring out new practices, 13:34 they could bring out things that supposedly were in the deposit, 13:37 which actually had not been there. 13:40 But they had the authority because, supposedly, they were 13:43 sitting on Moses' seat. 13:45 In other words, they had the authority and the clout 13:48 of Moses behind them. 13:50 So lets summarize the Hebrew, or the Jewish view of tradition 13:55 as it existed in the days of Christ. 13:57 First of all there was a deposit of truth composed of the 14:02 writings of Moses, and the unwritten traditions 14:05 which God had spoken orally to Moses. 14:08 Secondly there was a transmitting element. 14:10 From generation to generation these truths, both the written 14:15 and the unwritten, supposedly, were passed on in unbroken 14:19 succession all the way till the days of Christ. 14:23 And in the third place, you have the living interpreter 14:26 in the days of Christ, which are the scribes and the Pharisees 14:29 who sit on the throne of Moses, and speak ex cathedra. 14:34 In other words they speak from the throne, or they speak from 14:37 the seat of Moses. 14:39 They are the ones who can say, This is a genuine tradition, 14:42 and this is not a genuine tradition. 14:44 This is what is to be obeyed, and this is what is not 14:49 necessarily to be obeyed. 14:51 Interestingly enough, the people had to render blind obedience 14:58 to what was taught by the scribes and the Pharisees 15:02 who sat on Moses' seat. 15:03 I want to read this statement that's found in 15:06 Antiquities of the Jews. 15:08 It's written by Flavius Josephus once again, the Jewish Pharisee. 15:12 Notice what he says: 15:45 So notice there was a discrepancy between the 15:48 Sadducees and the Pharisees. 15:49 The Pharisees believed that, according to this, 15:52 the common people had to accept the tradition which was passed 15:55 on in continuous succession from the fathers. 15:59 Josephus continues saying: 16:18 In other words, their word was final. 16:22 If they said that this was found in the deposit of oral tradition 16:28 that God gave Moses, even if it wasn't in the writings of Moses, 16:31 people had to accept it on their say so, because they spoke from 16:36 Moses' seat; they spoke from the cathedra. 16:40 Now is this concept of tradition clear in your mind? 16:45 It's very important that we understand it because 16:47 we're going to come back to this when we deal with the 16:51 Roman Catholic view of tradition. 16:53 However, allow me to ask the question, What distinguished 16:58 the authority of Jesus from the authority of the scribes 17:03 and the Pharisees? 17:04 It's interesting to notice that time and again in the gospels 17:08 the Pharisees and the scribes are questioning the right 17:12 of Jesus to teach. 17:13 They're asking Him, On what authority are you doing this? 17:17 Because they were sitting on Moses' seat. 17:19 They said, we can teach the writings of Moses, and we can 17:22 say what is a genuine oral tradition and what isn't, 17:26 but this guy didn't even go to our schools. 17:28 By what authority are you teaching these things? 17:32 Allow me to give you some examples. 17:34 Matthew 7:28, 29, immediately after the parable of the man 17:41 who built his house on the rock, and the man who built his house 17:44 upon the sand, we find these words: 18:01 Jesus had never gone to the rabbinical schools, 18:04 and yet we're told that Jesus spoke with authority, 18:08 and not as the scribes. 18:10 Once again in Matthew 13:54 we find these words: 18:23 This is Jesus. 18:35 In other words, where does this man get His wisdom from? 18:38 He hasn't come to learn from us, the theological cadre of Israel; 18:43 the ones who are able to say what is a genuine 18:45 tradition and what isn't. 18:47 Also in John 7:15 we find the same issue coming forth again. 18:53 We're told there: 19:05 And if you read the gospels, you'll find that the multitudes 19:09 followed Jesus. They admired His teaching. 19:13 They were attracted to His teaching, whereas the teaching 19:17 rooms of the Pharisees and the scribes were empty. 19:21 And the gospels tell us that because of this reason, 19:23 the scribes and Pharisees were jealous of Jesus. 19:26 You see, Jesus had authority, even though He had not studied 19:30 in the theological schools. 19:32 In John 7:46 we find the officers of the temple returning 19:38 to bring back a report to the Pharisees, because they had 19:41 been sent to listen to Jesus. 19:43 And notice what these officers said: 19:52 In other words there is something powerful 19:54 in His manner of speaking. 19:56 Once again, in Mark 11:27, 28, we find the same phenomenon. 20:03 We're told there: 20:28 In other words, where do you get Your authority from? 20:31 You should have gotten it from us, because we sit on the 20:33 because we sit on the cathedra. 20:35 We say what can be taught and what can't be taught, 20:39 what is a genuine tradition, and what is not a genuine tradition. 20:42 Well, as we read the gospels, we discover the reason why 20:47 the teachings of Jesus had power and authority. 20:50 It's because Jesus Christ, whenever He spoke, 20:54 He corroborated what He said with Holy Scripture. 20:59 You will never find Jesus saying, Rabbi Shammai said 21:04 such and such a thing, or Rabbi Hillel said 21:07 such and such a thing. 21:08 You'll never find Jesus quoting the theological experts 21:13 of His day and age. 21:14 You'll never notice that Jesus quotes oral tradition 21:18 that supposedly went back to Moses. 21:21 Jesus always confronted His enemies, and always taught 21:26 from the word of God. 21:28 Allow me to give you some examples. 21:31 On the Mount of Temptation, according to Matthew 4, 21:34 three times Jesus said to the devil, It is written. 21:41 And, by the way, He quoted three times from the 21:44 book of Deuteronomy. 21:45 Deuteronomy 8:3, 6:16, and 6:13. 21:51 Jesus corroborated His mission, and defended Himself against 21:55 temptation through quoting the word. 21:58 When Jesus began His ministry we find in Luke 4:21 that He 22:05 quoted Isaiah 61:1, 2. 22:08 The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me. 22:11 He authenticated His mission through Scripture. 22:15 When the young lawyer came to Jesus and asked Him what the 22:18 great commandment was, Jesus says, Well, 22:20 you're an expert in the law. 22:22 You're a lawyer. You're a scribe. 22:24 You tell me! And then this young man, of course, quotes 22:28 Scripture, because Jesus said, What is it that the law contains 22:32 about this? We find also in Matthew 21:42, in the parable 22:38 of the vineyard workers, that Jesus quotes Scripture 22:41 by saying, the stone that the builders rejected has become 22:47 the chief cornerstone. 22:48 Also, Matthew 22:29, the seven brothers? 22:54 You remember the experience of the seven brothers? 22:56 They died one by one, and this woman was left 23:00 a widow each time, and so they asked Jesus, Whose wife is this 23:07 woman going to be in the resurrection? 23:09 And Jesus says, You ere, not knowing the Scriptures 23:13 or the power of God. 23:14 And then Jesus quotes the fact that God is the God of Abraham, 23:19 Isaac, and Jacob, and God is not a God of the dead, 23:22 but He is a God of the living. 23:24 He quotes Scripture once again. 23:26 When Jesus cleansed the temple He quoted Jeremiah saying, 23:31 You have made My house a den of thieves. 23:35 Once again He's authenticating what He's doing 23:38 from Holy Scripture. 23:39 When the Pharisees came to Jesus and said, Well, Moses said 23:43 that we could get divorced for any cause, Jesus says, 23:45 Yeah, you might say that, and you might interpret 23:48 Moses that way, but let Me tell you, 23:49 at the beginning it was not so. 23:51 He who made them at the beginning made 23:53 them male and female. 23:54 God established marriage. 23:55 Once again Jesus resolves the issue by going to Scripture. 24:00 In fact when they questioned Jesus how He can witnessing 24:05 in the things that he's talking about, Jesus says, Well, 24:10 your Scriptures say that in the mouth of two or three witnesses 24:13 every word is confirmed. 24:14 He says, Well, I have the witness of my Father, 24:16 and I have My witness, so that's two. 24:19 He's actually quoting Scripture in John 8:17, 18. 24:23 When they asked Jesus how He thought He had a right 24:27 to call Himself the Messiah, Jesus quoted Psalm 110:1, 2. 24:32 Sit at My right hand until I make Your 24:35 enemies Your footstool. 24:36 John 5, Jesus said, If you believe Moses, you would believe 24:41 Me, for he wrote about Me. 24:43 Even after the resurrection on the road to Emmaus, 24:46 we're told, And beginning with Moses, and from all of the 24:50 prophets, He told them in all of the Scriptures the things 24:53 concerning Himself. 24:55 What gave Jesus power and authority was the fact 24:59 that Jesus got His message from Scripture, 25:03 not from unwritten tradition. 25:06 Now I would like to go to an example of this concept 25:12 in the days of Jesus. 25:13 This is the passage that we find in Mark 7:1-13. 25:20 And I'm going to read this passage, and I'm going to 25:22 stop as we go along to underline certain very important points. 25:33 I want you to notice that it's the same group, 25:35 it's the same group that sit on Moses cathedral. 25:39 They are the ones who think they have authority to define 25:42 what is a true tradition handed down from Moses. So it says: 26:04 Now this is not talking about hygiene. 26:06 This is not talking about washing your dirty 26:09 hands before you eat. 26:10 This is a practice which had been established by oral 26:15 tradition that they needed to ceremonially wash their hands 26:19 several times as they were about to partake of their meal. 26:23 Notice verse 3: 26:33 And now I want you to notice: 26:36 Remember that word. 26:37 That's a technical term. 26:43 That also is a technical term. 26:49 Why did they practice the ceremonial washing? 26:52 Because Moses said so? 26:53 No, because they hold the tradition of the elders. 26:59 Now what does this expression mean; 27:01 the tradition of the elders? 27:03 Notice what the Jerome Bible Commentary has to say. 27:06 This is a Roman Catholic Bible Commentary. 27:08 The expression,... 27:15 That is a term of the rabbi's. 27:29 Did you catch that? 27:31 I'll read it again. 27:32 This expression, the tradition of the elders, is a rabbinical 27:35 term for the body of unwritten laws that the Pharisees 27:39 considered as equally binding as the written Torah. 27:44 Now notice verse 4. 27:51 And notice that this is only the tip of the iceberg. 27:54 There are many other things in which they go by tradition also. 28:02 Remember that word: 28:06 These are technical terms: received and hold. 28:15 Now what terms have we noticed so far: holding, tradition, 28:21 received, hold, passed on. 28:27 I want you to remember those terms, because we're going 28:29 to come back to them. 28:30 Notice verse 5: 28:44 In other words, why don't they go by the tradition that we say 28:46 goes all the way back to the days of Moses, 28:48 even though it's not written in the writings of Moses? 28:51 Notice verse 6: 28:58 How is Jesus going to face this issue? 29:00 He's going to quote Scripture. 29:12 And now notice this: 29:21 What happens when you follow the commandments of men, 29:24 and you follow tradition instead of the word of God? 29:26 You are practicing what kind of worship? 29:28 You are practicing vain worship, which means useless worship. 29:33 So when you follow the traditions of men instead of 29:36 the word of God, you are following, actually you are 29:40 practicing vain or meaningless worship. 29:44 We'll come back to that later. 29:45 Now lets go on to verse 8. 29:53 Let me ask you, what is the issue in this passage? 29:55 It's between tradition and the commandment of God. 29:59 It's between tradition and the word of God. 30:03 Notice once again: 30:11 And notice the tip of the iceberg again. 30:17 The issue, once again, is tradition 30:20 versus the word of God. 30:21 And those who follow the traditions of men are practicing 30:25 what kind of worship? are practicing vain worship. 30:28 Now notice verse 9: 30:38 And now He's going to quote Scripture again. 30:41 He's going to show how their tradition contradicts 30:44 the written word of God. 30:45 How their tradition contradicts a commandment of God. 30:49 Notice verse 10: 30:53 This is Exodus 20:17. 31:04 Is that the commandment of God? Yes. 31:07 Was it written in the writings of Moses? Yes, it is. Verse 11. 31:42 Now what Jesus is referring to, the tradition that He's 31:47 referring to here is the tradition of Corban. 31:51 Now, basically what Corban meant; 31:54 the word Corban means dedicated. 31:56 Children could actually dedicate all of their possessions to the 32:00 temple, but they could use all of their possessions freely 32:04 until they died, and then it passed over to the temple, 32:07 which means that their parents could be deprived while they 32:11 lived, because they could use everything, and they could say 32:14 to their parents, Sorry, I can't help you, because this has 32:17 been dedicated to the temple. 32:19 Interesting that this tradition of man contradicted 32:23 the commandment that said, Honor your 32:25 father and your mother. 32:26 In other words, they were annulling the written word of 32:30 God through this tradition. 32:32 By the way, the Pharisees and scribes were expert 32:36 at categorizing sin. 32:39 You know, some of the violations of traditions they considered 32:43 grave offenses while violations of clearly revealed duties 32:48 by God were considered trivial. 32:50 Allow me to read you this statement from 32:52 The Desire of Ages, page 616. 33:08 Dare we call them maybe venial sins? 33:20 Could we call that maybe mortal? Now notice: 33:45 And do you know what this concept of tradition led to? 33:48 It led to the rejection of Jesus Christ, and to the rejection 33:54 of the Jewish nation. 33:55 Now we need to move on to the Roman Catholic 33:59 view of tradition. 34:00 And you're going to find a striking similarity. 34:05 First of all you're going to find that instead of speaking 34:08 about Moses, they speak about Peter and the apostles. 34:12 You see those are the ones who have the deposit of the faith. 34:16 In fact the Roman Catholic Church teaches that many of 34:19 the things that the apostles spoke are not found written. 34:23 They are actually unwritten traditions. 34:26 They are oral traditions. 34:27 And so we can't go only by what the apostles wrote, 34:30 we need to go also by what the apostles spoke, 34:33 which is preserved in the deposit of tradition. 34:36 Interestingly enough, in the Roman Catholic Church there is 34:40 also a mechanism for transmitting truth in these 34:45 unwritten traditions, and the writings of Moses. 34:48 It's known as apostolic succession. 34:51 One bishop passing on the authority to the next bishop 34:55 by ordination, and successively all the way till the bishops 35:00 of our day and age; very similar to the situation of the Jews 35:04 in the days of Christ. 35:06 Also the Roman Catholic Church believes that there needs to be 35:10 a living interpreter at every age to show which traditions 35:15 are genuine and reliable, and which traditions are not. 35:19 And they call this, by the way, the magisterium of the church. 35:24 It's also called the teaching office of the church. 35:28 I don't know whether you're aware of this, but when the Pope 35:34 speaks for the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church, 35:38 he actually speaks ex-cathedra. 35:43 That is the identical word that we found in Matthew 23:2. 35:48 The scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses' cathedra. 35:52 When the Pope speaks as a spokesman for all of the 35:55 college of bishops, the living voice of the church, 35:58 the magisterium of the church, he speaks from the throne; 36:03 he speaks ex-cathedra. 36:06 Now allow me to read you some remarkable statements from 36:10 Roman Catholicism, and I want you to remember the terminology 36:14 that we read from Mark 7. 36:16 It's very, very similar, strikingly similar. 36:19 I'm going to read now from Vatican II, documents of 36:23 Vatican II, the specific decree which is called Di Verbum, 36:29 which is on Revelation, on the word of God. 36:32 By the way, this is infallible because it was proclaimed 36:35 in a Church Council by the consensus of the bishops 36:39 who were present. Listen to this: 37:24 Are you noticing the terminology? Identical! 38:04 Now notice that this document is going to speak about the 38:08 authority of the magisterium. 39:29 You know, there's a whole section in the Roman Catholic 39:32 Catechism of the Catholic Church. 39:35 I'd just like to mention it, because we don't have time to 39:38 read all of the statements, but it is article 2, paragraph 76, 39:41 to 86, and you will be amazed at the number of times that the 39:46 words received, handed on, tradition, hold; the very words 39:51 that we found in Mark 7 are used in this particular section 39:56 of the Catholic Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church. 39:59 Interestingly enough, Pope Pius XII 40:04 had these words to say: 40:28 In other words, if the deposit has something that's implicit or 40:31 obscure, the magisterium can bring it forth and say, 40:35 This was in the deposit of faith all the time. 40:38 Now allow me to read you another statement from Francis Butler. 40:43 These are all Roman Catholic theologians. 40:47 These are striking admissions. 40:58 What an admission! 41:59 We believe that there are 66. 42:00 He continues saying: 42:26 And now here comes the most critical part of this statement. 42:30 Butler says this: 42:55 The teaching office of the Catholic Church has the 42:58 same authority as the scribes and Pharisees. 43:00 Only the theological experts can tell you what tradition means, 43:05 and how it applies to life. 43:07 And people must implicitly obey it. 43:10 They cannot understand the tradition on their own, 43:13 they have to depend on the scholars. 43:16 Notice this statement from John O'Brien, who for quite a period 43:21 of time taught at Notre Dame University in Indiana. 43:24 He actually wrote a very well known book, 43:27 The Faith of Millions. 43:28 Notice what he has to say: 43:54 That's amazing! He continues saying: 44:05 Of course the Bible says that that living interpreter 44:08 is the Holy Spirit. 44:09 But notice what he says: 44:39 One more interesting statement. 44:41 This comes from the book, A Course in Religion for Catholic 44:45 High Schools and Academy's. 44:46 This is actually a Bible book for the schools of the 44:49 Roman Catholic Church. 44:50 The author is John Laux, and notice what he says: 44:58 In other words, the written Scriptures, and the oral 45:01 traditions that have been passed on are called 45:03 the remote rule of faith. 45:05 And then he explains why. 45:15 That's closer. 45:38 So just as in the days of Christ, the scribes and the 45:42 Pharisees sat on Moses' seat and said, You must obey this, 45:45 because this is part of either the written word of God, 45:49 or part of the passed on traditions. 45:51 In the same way the Roman Catholic Church says the living 45:54 interpreter of the Bible and oral tradition is the 45:58 magisterium of the church. 46:00 And therefore everyone should listen and obey what the 46:04 magisterium defines as the truth. 46:07 Now there are many traditions that are not found in Scripture 46:13 that are taught by the Roman Catholic Church. 46:15 For example, the idea that Mary is the mother of God. 46:18 You'll never find that expression in Scripture. 46:20 For example, the immaculate conception of Mary; 46:23 the Bible doesn't even address the birth of Mary. 46:26 The idea of the perpetual virginity of Mary. 46:29 We have a clear impression in Scripture by what we've studied, 46:32 that Mary most likely had other children. 46:35 The idea that Mary ascended to heaven after she died 46:40 on the third day: totally absent from Scripture. 46:43 The question is, How can these teachings be 46:46 accepted as genuine? 46:48 Simply because the magisterium says that this is part of the 46:52 deposit of the faith which has been transmitted 46:55 by oral tradition. 46:57 Now allow me to provide you one great example as we 47:03 draw this study to a close. 47:05 Jesus, when He was on this earth, had great controversies 47:11 with the religious leaders, with the scribes and Pharisees. 47:14 The greatest source of conflict between Jesus 47:18 and the scribes and the Pharisees was over 47:21 the observance of the Sabbath. 47:22 Jesus, in fact, most of His healings were done in chronic 47:28 cases, people who it was not an emergency. 47:30 You know, they weren't gravely ill. 47:32 They weren't at the point of death. 47:33 Jesus made it a point to heal these people on the Sabbath. 47:38 And the Pharisees and the scribes would say, 47:40 It is not lawful for you to heal people on the Sabbath. 47:45 And Jesus said, for example, in Matthew 12:12, It is lawful 47:50 for Me to heal people on the Sabbath. 47:52 Now on what authority did the Pharisees say that it wasn't 47:55 lawful, and on what authority did Jesus say 47:58 that it was lawful? 47:59 The fact is that after the Babylonian captivity, 48:03 where God's people had gone because they had fallen into 48:06 idolatry among the nations before this. 48:09 After the captivity the leaders of the Jewish nation said, 48:13 we're never going to fall into idolatry again. 48:16 And they decided that they would protect the Sabbath 48:20 from being broken. 48:21 And so they wrote 613 rules, or laws, which they called the 48:27 fence around the law. 48:29 None of these traditions and ideas were 48:33 contained in Scripture. 48:34 They were simply additions to Scripture, supposedly from oral 48:40 tradition which had been passed on. 48:43 And so when Jesus said, It is lawful to do good 48:47 on the Sabbath, He was going back to the Sabbath 48:49 in the Old Testament. 48:50 When the Pharisees and the scribes said, It is not lawful 48:53 to do good on the Sabbath, they were going back to this mass 48:56 of traditions which had been written after 48:59 the Babylonian captivity. 49:01 Interestingly enough, the Sabbath of the Pharisees 49:06 was actually a false Sabbath, because it was a 49:10 Sabbath created by them. 49:12 The observance of the Sabbath, as taught by the Pharisees, 49:16 was not the observance of the Sabbath that God had taught 49:19 in Holy Scripture, and therefore they had established a Sabbath 49:23 not created by God, but a Sabbath created by man 49:27 based on human tradition. 49:29 And, by the way, this was false worship, 49:34 because they were worshipping on a Sabbath which had been 49:37 created by man, and had not been created by God. 49:40 And I'm not talking about the specific day, I'm talking about 49:43 the manner in which they kept the Sabbath. 49:46 In Scripture God said how to keep the Sabbath. 49:48 They added all these traditions, and they said you're supposed 49:51 to keep it this way. 49:52 But their traditions contradicted the proper way 49:56 of observing the Sabbath as Jesus had taught. 49:59 In other words, the controversy in the days of Christ was over 50:04 the wrong way of keeping the Sabbath. 50:06 The issue was not the wrong day, the issue was the wrong way 50:11 of keeping the Sabbath. 50:12 You see, this was the Sabbath of the Pharisees, 50:14 because they had created it. 50:16 This was false worship, because when people kept that Sabbath 50:19 they were keeping the Sabbath of the Pharisees. 50:21 They were not keeping the Sabbath of the Lord. 50:23 Now let me ask you this, Is the Sabbath issue going to be 50:29 the main point of controversy in the final 50:33 conflict on Planet Earth? Yes, it is. 50:37 Is it going to be a similar issue to the issue 50:41 in the days of Christ? 50:43 Very similar; only one difference. 50:46 The conflict in the days of Christ was the right way 50:50 versus the wrong way of keeping the Sabbath. 50:54 At the end of time the controversy is going to be 50:58 the right day versus the wrong day. 51:00 And so the issue in the days of Christ is the right 51:05 way or the wrong way. 51:06 At the end of time it's going to be the right 51:08 day or the wrong day. 51:10 Now the Roman Catholic Church teaches that we're supposed 51:14 to keep Sunday in honor of the resurrection. 51:16 Where do they get that idea from? 51:18 You certainly don't find it in Scripture. 51:21 Nowhere in Scripture does it say we're supposed to 51:23 go to church on Sunday. 51:24 Nowhere does it say that we're supposed to keep Sunday 51:27 in honor of the resurrection of Jesus. 51:29 Nowhere does it say that Sunday is a holy day dedicated to God. 51:34 Scripture does not say this; Scripture uniformly says, 51:38 the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. 51:41 Jesus went into the synagogue on Sabbath. 51:43 Paul, and Peter, and the apostles in the book of Acts, 51:47 went to the synagogue observing the Sabbath of the Lord. 51:50 Now let me ask you, when the Roman Catholic Church says 51:54 that it is Sunday and not the Sabbath, are they making of 51:57 none effect the commandment of God? 52:00 They most certainly are! 52:02 In other words, by their tradition, which they admit. 52:05 They say this came in by tradition. 52:07 It didn't come in by the word of God. 52:09 By their tradition are they actually contradicting a clearly 52:14 revealed commandment of God? 52:16 If Jesus were alive today would He say, You have made of 52:20 none effect the word of God, you have made of non effect 52:23 the commandment of God by your tradition? Absolutely! 52:27 And the controversy at the end, folks, is not going to be over 52:30 the way in which the Sabbath is kept, but it is over the day 52:35 in which the Sabbath is kept. 52:36 Are you understanding what I am saying? 52:38 But it's the same issue. 52:39 You see, Sunday is a day of worship created by man, 52:43 by the tradition of man. 52:45 And, therefore, those who observe Sunday, 52:47 knowing that the Bible teaches that we're supposed to observe 52:50 the Sabbath, they are serving God in vain. 52:53 They are worshipping in vain. 52:55 Do remember Jesus said that by keeping the tradition 53:00 of the elders, the Jews were actually serving God, 53:04 and worshipping God in vain? 53:05 You see, the reason why is because they were keeping 53:09 a Sabbath of their creation. 53:10 And at the end of time the Christian world, 53:13 will keep a Sabbath of their creation. 53:15 It wasn't a Sabbath created by God. 53:18 It was a Sabbath created by man. 53:20 And when we keep that day of worship, 53:22 we're actually practicing vain worship, because that's not 53:26 the day on which God said that we are supposed to worship. 53:29 Are you understanding what I'm saying? 53:31 That's what it means to make of none effect the word of God 53:34 by our tradition, or the commandment of 53:37 God by our tradition. 53:38 And, by the way, I find it very ironic that the same individuals 53:44 who were aggravated at Jesus because Jesus healed 53:50 people on the Sabbath, several times in the gospels we're told 53:53 that they plotted to kill Jesus on the Sabbath. 53:56 In other words, because Jesus didn't keep the Sabbath 53:59 the way they said, according to their traditions, on the Sabbath 54:03 they actually plotted to kill. 54:05 So they were not only making of no effect the Sabbath 54:08 commandment, but they were also making of none effect 54:11 the commandment that says, Thou shalt not kill. 54:14 Now let me ask you, Does Scripture say that in the last 54:18 days the Christian world is going to rise against those 54:23 who keep a different day than they keep? 54:25 Bible prophecy teaches that, folks. 54:28 In other words, there will be a double violation 54:32 of the commandment of God. 54:33 1. Because they will seek to impose the wrong day, 54:37 by tradition, and will be aggravated against those who 54:41 keep the right day. 54:42 And it will reach even to the point of giving a law 54:45 not to be able to buy or sell, or a law that those who do not 54:50 live by this law are to be what? are to be killed. 54:54 You say, This could never happen. 54:56 The fact is that it happened in the days of Christ. 54:59 What makes you think that it's not going to happen 55:01 at the end of time? 55:02 Incidentally, the Jewish view of tradition in the days of Christ 55:08 led the supposed people of God to reject Jesus Christ. 55:15 Is it just possible that at the end of time the Christian world 55:20 will also claim to serve God, but will actually reject God 55:24 by following tradition, and having the same view 55:28 of tradition as was held by the Jews in the days of Christ? 55:31 I believe the evidence shows that this is so. 55:34 Allow me to say something about John Paul II. 55:38 I'm not being critical of him individually, but he wrote a 55:44 document which we can analyze, and we can be critical of 55:47 if it's not in harmony with Scripture. 55:49 The name of the Pastoral Letter was dies Domini, 55:52 the Day of the Lord. 55:53 And in that document he quoted 212 references to scholars, 56:00 church councils, creeds, and church fathers 56:02 of the Roman Catholic Church. 56:03 And he kind of splattered the document with a text 56:08 here and there, the same texts which have traditionally been 56:11 used by Protestants to try and prove that the Sabbath has 56:14 been changed to Sunday. 56:15 But no matter how much philosophy he uses, 56:19 and how much reasoning, and how many arguments he uses, 56:22 the Bible is very clear. 56:24 It says the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. 56:29 Do you know that in the end time the controversy is going to 56:32 be over the same issue as in the days of Jesus? 56:35 Allow me to read you this statement from that classic 56:38 prophetic book that everyone should read, 56:41 The Great Controversy, page 582. 57:10 Will we, as God's people, not live by tradition, 57:16 but live as Jesus did, by every word which proceeds 57:22 out of the mouth of God, as found in written Scripture? |
Revised 2015-03-09