Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger (31 page)

… I pray you, reformers, tell me whence you have taken
the canon of the Scripture which you follow? You have not taken it from the
Jews, for the books of the Gospels would not be there; nor from the Council of
Laodicea, for the Apocalypse would not be in it; nor from the Councils of
Carthage or of Florence, for Ecclesiasticus and the Machabees would be there.
Whence, then, have you taken it? In good sooth, like canon was never spoken of
before your time. The Church never saw canon of the Scripture in which there
was not either more or less than yours. What likelihood is there that the Holy Spirit
has hidden himself from all antiquity, and that after 1500 years he has
disclosed to certain private persons the list of the true Scriptures?
[765]

Jerome, in the late fourth century, and subsequent authors
who relied upon his judgment rejected the Deuterocanon and accepted the
remaining books, but history has shown his new canon to be an innovation and
the basis for his new canon has been demonstrated to be false. Where then do
you turn? The canon was indeed something that
has been received
. The
Church received it from Christ and his Apostles. How do we know which books the
Church received as inspired Scripture? Augustine answers this question quite
neatly:
consult the churches
, especially those known to have been established
by the Apostles, and see which books are read there as Scripture. After this
has been done, the witness of the early Church is clear: the Deuterocanon is
inspired Scripture.

Ironically, the exaltation of Scripture, as envisioned by
Sola
Scriptura
, can only be experienced and practiced within the Catholic
Church. The Catholic Church accepts the Scripture as something received from
Our Lord and His Apostles. It does not determine what Scripture is, but it
manifests its inspired status by reading it in its liturgy as the word of God.
When the canon is contested, the Church reaffirms the gift it has received from
the Apostles. It is only within the confines of the historic Catholic and
Apostolic Church that Scripture stands predetermined, untampered with by mere
traditions of men. Outside of the historic Christian Church the Bible can never
achieve the highest aspirations of Protestant Reformation.

Protestants sometimes allege that the Deuterocanon contains
historical, logical, theological, and moral errors. Since Scripture is immune
from errors, they argue that Deuterocanon must be disqualified from being
considered part of Scripture.

The historical response to these accusations has been either
to attempt to reconcile these supposed errors or to show similar difficulties
in the Protocanon. These tactics often fall on deaf ears. John Henry Newman
once said of believers, “Ten thousand difficulties does not equal one
doubt.”  But for those who are not inclined to see the Deuterocanon as
Scripture, one doubt sufficiently establishes ten thousand difficulties. Even
if one were to harmonize with ninety-nine percent certainty that a given error
does not exist, the non-Catholic would deem the remaining one percent
sufficient to reject the work. Appealing to similar problems in the Protocanon
likewise falls on deaf ears because such arguments appear be denigrating
Scripture because the “real errors” of the Dueterocanon cannot compare to the
mere “difficulties” of the Protocanon.

Herein lies the problem. What constitutes a real error, as
opposed to a “Bible difficulty”? Can either of these two be established beyond
all doubt? Let us answer the second question first. All Scripture is inspired
or God-breathed, but inspiration applies only to the original text. Subsequent
copies are not immune from error or corruption. Over centuries of manually
re-copying the sacred text, copyists undoubtedly made errors. Fortunately, we
possess a large number of copies of the New Testament, some of which were
created not long after the original inspired text (called the autograph) was
made. Through the science of textual criticism, we possess a theoretic text of
the New Testament that is nearly identical to the original inspired text. The
Old Testament text does not share these benefits. Even after the discoveries of
the Dead Sea Scrolls, the earliest manuscripts we own are still centuries
removed from the originals. Despite the remarkable fidelity of Jewish scribes
over the centuries, difficulties and corruptions exist in the Old Testament;
and the ability to solve these difficulties conclusively is quite beyond our
reach. It is, therefore, impossible to
demonstrate
the existence of
errors in a given text without looking at the autograph. All that can be
produced is a high degree of the probability for a given error.

Even if it were possible to show that an “error” did exist
in the autograph, it remains to be proved that the author made the
“error.”  An inspired writing is without error only if it is interpreted
in line with the
author’s original intent.
It is, obviously, possible
for the reader to
understand
a text incorrectly, so as to make it appear
to constitute or contain an error. For example, Our Lord said, “If anyone comes
to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and
brothers and siters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple.”
[766]
Interpreted one
way, Our Lord could be made to teach a moral error.
[767]
Those interpreting this passage in the
spirit of the Church, however, understand Christ to be using the literary form
of
hyperbole
, which is a deliberate exaggeration or overstatement to
make a point. In this case, the error existed in our interpretation and not in
the document itself.

If then, we can never know with certainty of the presence or
absence of an error, how do we know if
any
book of the Bible is
inerrant? Inerrancy is the
product
of inspiration. The Holy Spirit, who
is its primary author of inspired Scripture, can never deceive nor be deceived.
The inspired books, therefore, can neither be mistaken nor deliberately deceive
others. It is the inspired status of a given book that guarantees for us its
inerrancy, not our own critical historical investigations. And the
determination of inspiration
must necessarily
come
before
any
other question is asked. If a text is inspired, then all difficulties are
understood to be errors only in appearance and not actual errors. If, on the
other hand, one believes that a text not inspired (i.e. it does not have the
Holy Spirit as its primary author.), then there is a possibility that the
difficulty may be in fact a real error.
[768]
The reason why the supposed moral “error”
committed in Luke 14:26 above was so easy to solve comes from our
pre-determination that the Gospel of Luke is, in fact, an inspired text and it
cannot err. Based on this presupposition, we endeavor to harmonize the
difficulty.

The appeal to “errors” in the Deuterocanon ultimately ends
up committing the formal fallacy of
begging the question
because the
Protestant begins all his inquiries with the presupposition that the
Deuterocanon is
not
inspired. When difficulties are found in the
Deuterocanon, the reader assumes that these difficulties are true errors and
concludes that the Deuterocanon must not be inspired.
[769]
The Deuterocanon cannot be inspired because
it has errors, and it has errors because it is not inspired. For this reason,
neither Catholics nor non-Catholics are persuaded to change their position by
arguments based on supposed errors. The same is true with pointing out similar
difficulties in the Protocanon or the New Testament. For Protestants who reject
the inspiration of the Deuterocanon and accept the inspiration of the New
Testament, comparing difficulties between the two texts would be like comparing
apples to oranges. The
a priori
conviction of inspiration and inerrancy
renders the appeal moot.

The best way out of this dilemma is not to enter it at all.
Biblical inerrancy is not based upon our feeble abilities to solve every
problem. Our faith rests upon the God who inspired the text, not in our own
abilities or in us. First determine if a text is inspired and only then
determine if errors exist. Doing otherwise is not only anti-Protestant (placing
ourselves as judge over Scripture), but it has also served to destroy belief in
Biblical inerrancy within mainline Protestantism.

Appeals to supposed errors in the Deuterocanon have long
peppered Protestant/Catholic debates and rendered it far uglier than it needed
to be. Because Catholicism was its target, few had the forethought that this
method could be used against the rest of the Bible. As the Reformed scholar
Edward Ruess noted, “The scoffs thrown at the little fish of Tobit will sooner
or later destroy Jonah’s whale.”
[770]
Ruess’ prophetic words have been fulfilled by the extravagances
of higher criticism. After the Apocrypha controversy had subsided, critics
turned
the same
weapons against, not only the Prophet Jonah, but also
the rest of the books of Scripture. So-called errors and absurdities were
quickly expunged from the Protocanon of the Old and New Testaments. Whole books
were labeled (or libeled) as myths and fables. The end result is a bible where
only a few passages are worthy of belief. Anti-Catholic polemicists have
unwittingly opened a Pandora’s Box. They assumed no one would ever dare charge
the rest of Scripture with errors and absurdities, yet the advent of Liberal
Protestantism brought with it individuals who did not fear to apply these
arguments consistently throughout the entire Bible.

The problem at the heart of this line of argumentation is
one of pride. It places the intellect in the role of judge, allowing it to sit
in judgment upon the Word of God. Yet we must know in advance what the Word of
God
is
before offering it this kind of allegiance. That is why the canon
of Scripture
must
be received as Sacred Tradition.

It takes humility to accept the canon of Scripture as given
to the Church. But once we have made such an act all the glories of the Bible
open up to us. We may humbly submit our intellect to the text, sitting at the
Master’s feet like little children, knowing that even if the power to solve all
difficulties is beyond us, there is nevertheless a solution. To do otherwise
would be not only anti-Protestant (since if violates
Sola Scriptura
),
but anti-Catholic and anti-Christian as well.

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