It stands out that sola scriptura, one of the core doctrines of Protestantism, did not exist prior to the fourteenth century (with John Wycliffe), and it did not become prevalent until the sixteenth century (with Martin Luther). To put it bluntly, sola scriptura simply did not exist before about 1,200 years after the last of the apostles had died.
Protestants claim that the Bible teaches sola scriptura and that the doctrine goes back to Jesus. This claim amounts to an attempt to introduce the belief back into the pages of Scripture, in the process jumping over fourteen centuries of Church practice and belief. A review of historical continuity—or lack thereof—shows whether or not a belief originated with Jesus and the apostles or if it appeared later in time.
Let’s look at some of the more popular passages that Protestants cite to establish sola scriptura’s ancient pedigree. It is beyond the scope of this article to conduct a systematic refutation of sola scriptura from a biblical perspective, but this list—and a Catholic response to the items in it—can get us to a working understanding of Protestant proof texts and how they fall flat.
1) Matthew 4:1-11: “It is written . . .”
Jesus is here being tempted in the desert by the devil. He responds to the devil three times by saying, “It is written . . .” and then quotes Scripture.
But Jesus is not quoting just any Scripture. In all three instances, he is quoting from Deuteronomy (8:3, 6:16, and 6:13), and these passages are specifically about the Israelites’ experience in the desert when they were unfaithful to God and failed to trust him. Jesus was recalling the Israelites’ failures so that he could demonstrate absolute trust in and fidelity to God where they did not.
In other words, in a decisive and particularly relevant blow to the devil, Jesus was redeeming and transforming the Israelites’ failure. The underlying issue has nothing at all to do with sola scriptura, but rather with man’s relationship to God. Jesus was demonstrating that he is the perfectly obedient Son, as the Israelites should have been, and when the devil realizes he can’t get Jesus to fail God, he departs.
2) Acts 17:10-11: “The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea; and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with all eagerness, examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so.”
It might look as though “Scripture alone” is the sole rule of faith for the Bereans. But it is important here to understand the broader context.
Paul was preaching in Thessalonica for three weeks and gaining converts in the process. But because some of those converts were coming from the synagogue where Paul was preaching, the Jews there were not pleased about losing members of their congregation and hence stirred up a commotion. They attempted to bring Paul and Silas before an assembly to accuse them of causing problems, but when they couldn’t find these two at Jason’s house, where they were staying, they instead dragged Jason and some other Christians before the city’s magistrates. Word was sent to Paul and Silas that they were in danger, and so the Christians in Thessalonica had them leave the
city under the cover of darkness and go to Berea. There, Paul went to another synagogue and preached about Jesus. But, as a counter to the aggressive response Paul experienced in Thessalonica, the Bereans received his message “with all eagerness.”
So the Bereans were “more noble” not because they searched the scriptures, but because they did not treat Paul and Silas harshly, as the Thessalonians had. They were truly open-minded in the sense of being willing to consider what Paul was telling them. That is hardly a matter of supporting the idea that Scripture is the only infallible authority.
Furthermore, there are absolutely no Old Testament passages (“the scriptures” to which Paul was referring) that clearly state that “the Messiah had to suffer and die and rise from the dead on the third day.” It is Paul’s authoritative, apostolic teaching that “connected these dots” for the Bereans. But if sola scriptura were true, no examination and searching of the scriptures would have been necessary, because the teaching in question is the central teaching of the Christian faith.
But Acts 17 shows that this teaching was not sufficiently clear to the Thessalonians or the Bereans, who came to understand it only after Paul expounded on the Old Testament. If anything, this passage supports the Catholic position that Scripture is always coupled with official magisterial teaching.
3) 1 Corinthians 4:6: “I have applied all this to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brethren, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another.”
Protestants are quick to emphasize the “not going beyond what is written” part, as Catholics allegedly do when they employ Sacred Tradition. A lot could be said about this verse, but consider at least the following.
The first Protestant leaders did not see this verse as helpful to their sola scriptura cause. None of them used this verse to establish the doctrine. John Calvin even said,
The clause above what is written may be explained in two ways—either as referring to Paul’s writings, or to the proofs from Scripture which he has brought forward. As this, however, is a matter of small moment, my readers may be left at liberty to take whichever they may prefer.
If Calvin felt that this verse was “of small moment,” whose interpretation was left to the reader’s personal preference, clearly he did not intend it as a proof text for sola scriptura.
In this same letter, Paul explicitly affirms the believers in Corinth for having adhered to Sacred Tradition: “I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you” (11:2). He is not going to advance one principle to the Corinthians in chapter four only to flatly contradict it in chapter eleven.
Bible scholars readily admit that the meaning of “what is written” is obscure, so how useful can this verse be in support of a central Protestant belief? If anything, Protestants would be guilty of eisegesis—reading something into the passage—instead of exegesis, pulling something out of the passage.
To give the reader some idea of the difficulties inherent in this verse, apologist Karlo Broussard offers the following possibilities as to what is meant by “what is written” (60-61):
- the scriptures in general concerning conduct for preachers;
- the Old Testament passages Paul already quoted in 1 Corinthians 1:19, 31; 2:16; 3:19-20;
- the metaphors of planting and building used in 1 Corinthians 3:15-17, the implication being that we should avoid false teachers who add to the gospel;
- more generally, to everything Paul himself wrote in the preceding chapters of the same epistle concerning Christian conduct;
- a Christian slogan or proverb used to address those causing discord in the community, a slogan that meant something akin to “keep within the rules”; or
- a public document for the Corinthian church that Paul modeled on cultic bylaws in order to lay out guidelines and principles necessary to preserve peace and prosperity.
The only clear thing seems to be that not going “beyond what is written” cannot possibly refer to sola scriptura.
There are many other proof texts we could discuss, but these suffice for our purposes. That is to say, if sola scriptura cannot be found until over a thousand years after Jesus’ earthly life, then the doctrine must lack the historical continuity intrinsic to apostolic teaching. Worse, in practice, we see that it initiated a radical break with the Christian past.
For more like this, check out Joel Peters’s new book Sola Scriptura Doesn’t Work, available online now.