A Thinking Reed

Luther and Sola Scriptura

Written by

Lee M.

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Some comments in the post below got off on a tangent about Stanley Hauerwas and the use of Scripture in the church and it got me thinking about the meaning of the Protestant principle of “sola scriptura.” After a bit of poking around I found an article by David W. Lotz of Union Theological Seminary called “The Proclamation of the Word in Luther’s Thought.”

Here’s a relevant bit:

The Holy Scriptures are justly called Word of God, the written Word, because they have God the Holy Spirit as their ultimate author: the prophets and apostles all spoke and wrote under the inspiration of the Spirit. Yet the Scriptures are the Word of God in a seconday or derivative sense because they always point beyond themselves to Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word, who is their matchless content; to the prophetic and apostolic gospel of Christ, which is their glorious theme; and to the church’s continuous proclamation of this biblical gospel, which is their true reason for being. The Scriptures possess sole normative authority for the church’s faith and life inasmuch as they are the source and standard of its teaching and preaching. Preachers must “extract” their message from the Scriptures to insure that they are now preaching the same gospel taht the prophets and apostles once proclaimed as the foundation of the church. Their message must be tested by the Scriptures to insure that it is truly gospel and so Word of God. Thus the Bible’s authority is ultimately rooted in the authority of the gospel of Christ, namely, that original spoken Word which brought forth the Scriptures and which is now available only in the Scriptures.

For Luther, according to Lotz, the oral proclamation of the gospel is primary because it is this proclamation which effects faith and salvation. This is God’s word in a more fundamental sense than the written word because it is the very act by which God calls sinners to salvation. It was necessary, however, to have a written testimony to make sure the church was preaching the same gospel that the apostles preached. That is why the Scriptures remain the source and norm for the church’s teaching and preaching.

Comments

5 responses to “Luther and Sola Scriptura”

  1. Joshie

    “The Scriptures possess sole normative authority for the church’s faith and life inasmuch as they are the source and standard of its teaching and preaching.”

    I’m sure some might call this a significant change, but I would want to poke Luther (as understood by Lotz) a bit here.

    The scriptures, while they are the normative authority for the church’s life and thought, are themselves a product of the church’s teaching in its formative period. The relationship between the Spirit, church and Bible is an ongoing dynamic one that is in continuity with the whole of the Bible. Understandings may shift over time and space, but the Spirit (and the proclaimation) is the same.

    I think Luther’s view of Sola Scriptura is also a good counter to how the idea is pitched today. Luther’s view of the scriptures is that they are the word of God because “they always point beyond themselves to Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word.” As opposed to being a thing unto themselves or them being conflated with the Word itself.

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  2. Eric Lee

    This is good stuff.

    When a student is trying to defend sola scriptura in a particular religion class Dr. Wright often asks, “Did the Bible die for your sins?”

    It’s a rhetorical device, but I think it works.

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  3. Joshie

    In Roman Catholic theology they call it Biblidolatry.

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  4. Lee

    Josh – I agree with you that there is a dynamic relationship between bible and church. I think what “sola scriptura” does, ideally, is to keep bringing the church back to its original proclamation. In that sense I would say it has a pre-eminent role. Maybe “prima scriptura” would be better?

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  5. asimplesinner

    We have posted about this at The Black Cordelias… Most notably with “Sola Scriptura“…

    It isn’t that we who do NOT advocate Sola Scriptura are of the thinking that the Scriptures are failable or problematic. We are of the thinking that individual interpretations can be.

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