The Doctrine of Authority

1.    Revelation

This is the primary source of the theology, and is also a basic category in theological thinking. Precisely what is the structure of revelation, and what grounds we may have for supposing that anything like revelation ever occurs, are questions that will be studied later. We may notice that essential to the idea of revelation is that we come to know through revelation has a gift life character. In the Christian religion, a person, Jesus Christ, is the bearer of revelation. Because of its gift-like character, revelation is of a different order from our ordinary matter-of-fact knowing of the world.

Revelation is a mode of religious experience, while our experience of the holy as judging, assisting, addressing, and the like, all have revelatory element. One cannot therefore draw a hard and fast line between experience and revelation, but in practice it is desirable to keep these two formative factors distinct I our theological thinking. Most Christian believes the Bible as the revelation of God. The Bible is regarded as possessing authority for Christians in matters of belief and ethics.

 

2.    Faith Communities: Testimonies of the communities of faiths

a)    The church has authority over Scripture. This position, which tends to be associated with Catholic theologians, is often expressed in words of Augustine of Hippo: “For my part, I should not believe the Gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church.” The authority of the biblical texts was determined by a process of reception, which involved an appeal to the apostolic tradition as the criterion of canonicity. “It was by the apostolic Tradition that the Church discerned which writings are to be included in the list of the sacred books” (Catechism of the Catholic Church).

b)    Scripture has authority over the church. This position, which tends to be associated with Protestant theologians, holds that the church recognized an inner quality to biblical works, which they possessed independently of the church’s decision to recognize them. John Calvin, for example, spoke of the secret (or internal) testimony of the Holy Spirit, which alone can authenticate inspired Scripture in the hearts of believers. In declaring a work “canonical,” the church thus responds to an internal quality of Scripture, and does not impose its own judgment as an expression of its authority.

c)    The church and Bible belong together, as an organic unity of community and text, making it impossible to allocate “authority” to either. This third position is often adopted by those who take the view that the historical process of the formation of the canon does not fit neatly into either of the two theological schemas already mentioned. Whether some place authority with the “people,” and others with the “book,” this locates the issue at their intersection: “people and book.” This is not inconsistent with either of the previous two models, but sets each of them in an expanded context.

 

3. Traditions and scripture

The tradition of the Church

The word ‘tradition’ comes from the Latin word traditio, which means handing over, or handing on. It is a thoroughly biblical idea. The apostle Paul reminded his readers that he was handing them down the core teachings of Jesus Christ.

Roman Catholic Church argued that the revelation comes to us both in the scripture and in the   tradition of the church. For protestant the scripture is the only source. Knowingly or unknowingly traditions helped us to determine our doctrines. But, we have to keep in mind that the role played by tradition is complementary

By tradition we mean all the things we receive from the past: books, doctrines, commentaries, Christian biographies, the written history is part of our tradition. The New Testament was written by using all sorts of tradition. These traditions are passed down from one generation to another generation. Even Paul quoted from other source (1Cor 15:3-11) .When we are remembering early Eucharistic worship was relatively dependent upon tradition. Tradition played a very important role even in the canonisation of the New Testament.

The Bible is accepted us the foundational document of the church. Bible is the revelation of God. But the full revelation of God is beyond tradition. Bible is the product of certain tradition. At present we will not be able to receive the full revelation of God. People who witness God put the revelation in capsule form.

Jesus is the product of Hebrew history. The Christian church emerged out of the Hebrew history. The New Testament is the preserved documents of the foundational events of the church. The New Testament is written in the light of the OT. We are Christian therefore Christ is our centre. Therefore the Bible must have regulating authority over our theology.

We do not have perfect understanding of the Bible. Our understanding of the Bible is limited and our understanding of the Bible differs. The doctrines that are taught implicitly in the Bible are taught explicitly in theology. We don’t find the doctrine of the trinity implicitly in the Bible but it was developed later. Things got crystallised by debates and discussion. And these crystallised thoughts and ideas formed our traditions.

Traditions help us to guard against individualism. The understanding we have of the Bible is different. Each can have their own interpretation. Therefore tradition helps us to go fight against individualism and over enthusiasm. Tradition helps against misleading private interpretation.

 We can never be completely free from tradition. Tradition is community wisdom of the past. Traditional wisdom of the past helps us reach further than we would be able to reach by ourselves. We can never wish away the 2000 years of biblical experience. Past witnesses that withstand the test of times should be our foundation.

Classic statements of doctrine are like milestones, they are indicators. Sometimes, there is the tendency in the church to reject tradition. But rejection of tradition is also rejection of the unity of the church. The church today has no direct access to Jesus Christ without the two thousand years tradition of the church. Tradition is the medium through which we get access to Jesus. The scripture is the regulative authority and there is no doubt about it. But tradition is also in one way or the other a regulative authority for we have to abide by the interpretative tradition of the church.

Uncritical and excessive use of tradition can lead to bad theology. There are certain traditions that are dead, that have lost its vitality. Those will naturally give way. We have to test our tradition by the Bible and not the other way round.