From: ricko@ee.uts.edu.au (Rick Jelliffe)
Newsgroups: aus.religion
Subject: Re: Interpretation of Scripture
Date: 15 Dec 92 12:14:16 GMT
Distribution: aus
Organization: University of Technology, Sydney
NNTP-Posting-Host: schutz.ee.uts.edu.au

andrewb@fgh.fgh.oz.au (Andrew Buchanan) writes:

>In article <ricko.723955451@ee.uts.EDU.AU> ricko@ee.uts.edu.au (Rick Jelliffe) writes:
>	
>	Why are implicit doctrines tradition?  It may be that a tradition
>	informs us and persuades us, but in principle only as it
>	illumines the text.  In principle Protestants stand loose to
>	all traditions.  

I think you have very clear understanding. But, even though Protestantism
over a long period stands loose from any one single thread of truth
necesarily, at any one time the immediate tradition is strong (that is an
unfortunate expression, I hope it is comprehensible). For instance, on
soc.religion.christian at the moment, the moderator has decided that there
is no compelling evidence in the Bible against homosexuality per se. This is
clearly against long term tradition, but is entirely consonant with
short-term tradition (or perhaps exposes the deeper lond-term traditions at
work:-). Catholic Tradition differs by being binding, under the notion that 
Jesus did not fail to teach the church about morals through the Holy Spirit.

>	Some, like the Trinity, continue to persuade,
>	others likes God's impassibility (inablility to suffer) no longer
>	persuade many, as the Bible's evidence of God's suffering is
>	read in a philosophical climate (less influenced by Aristotle
>	and more by Heraclitus) which doesn't obscure it as much.

Yes, every issue you have to be persuaded by, as a protestant. My brain hurt.

>>6/ If they are conservative, they will use some hierarchy of scriptural
>>passages which lets them understand scripture from first principles but
>>within certain boundaries. 

>	Now you are describing here the "implicit knowledge" that is
>	necessary to know anything at all.  In other words, if we want
>	to understand even what our eyes see, we need to have learnt
>	about 3-dimensionality, colour &c.  To understand the Bible
>	we learn certain key ideas in a form accessible to us (e.g. some
>	gospel presentation, or getting to know some Christian friend)
>	that help us to begin making sense of it.  Some preunderstandings
>	will be unhelpful, others more helpful.  But the existence of
>	preunderstandings or implicit knowledge doesn't override the primacy
>	of the knowledge itself.  

Why do most people who convert stay in the religion of their friends
then? I think for many people it completely determines it. But apart from
that quibble I hope you're right. Preaching is a part of Tradition.

>	Taking sight again, we don't say that 
>	our sight is only true because our visual system says so, that
>	our visual system is a separate authority to our sight!  Similarly,
>	the church tradition exists to help us understand the Bible, not
>	for its own sake.  

No, I think both sacred  Tradition and the Bible are there to reveal
to us Christ and the gospel. In countries where Christianity has been
suppressed, for example illiterate Japan under the Shoguns, the Bible is
no use for this: tradition is all they have. (As you proably know, when 
Japan was opened again late last century, the underground church founded by
St francis Xavier three hundred years before resurfaced around Kyushu.)

-ricko