James R. White, a long-standing anti-Mormon, prides himself on his alleged abilities as a scholar of Christian history. In 1996, in the anthology of essays edited by D. Kistler, Sola Scriptura! The Protestant Position on the Bible, White contributed an essay, “Sola Scriptura in the Early Church” where he tried to support sola scriptura from patristic literature. Much of his arguments were soundly refuted in the book, Not by Scripture Alone: A Catholic Critique of the Protestant Doctrine of Sola Scriptura, ed. Robert A. Sungenis (Queenship, 1997). However, note the following from a fellow Baptist, D.H. Williams, an expert in patristic and historical theology at Loyola University in Chicago, about the sloppiness of White’s work:
The essay entitled “Sola Scriptura and the Early Church” exhibits an extremely limited familiarly with patristic doctrinal history such that it claims Athanasius stood against Liberius, bishop of Rome (p. 42), whereas in fact, Athanasius sought the protection of Liberius’ successor Julius during his western exile, and he, of all the Greek fathers, remained the most intimate with Rome after Julius’s death in 352. There is hardly a case here for a proto-opposition between Protestants and Roman Catholics. Moreover, it is quite striking that the writer of this essay argues how Athanasius makes no appeal to unwritten tradition, and yet in the very circulation offered as proof of this point (Oratio Arianos III.29), we are introduced to Athanasius’s mention of Mary as Theotokos, bearer of God, an Alexandrian tradition which few Protestants would espouse! (D.H. Williams, Retrieving the Tradition & Renewing Evangelicalism: A Primer for Suspicious Protestants [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1999], 230 n. 4)
