Basil of Caesarea
By way of
example some Protestants note that Basil, in his letter to Eustathius, agreed
to “let God-inspired Scripture decide between us.” (Basil of Caesarea, Epistle
189.3) Madrid correctly responds that Basil’s epistemology cannot be
constructed from a single letter. (Patrick Madrid, Answer Me This, pp.
48-52) In fact, Basil elsewhere bolsters Madrid’s own position, deriving his
beliefs and practices from Scripture and unwritten apostolic tradition together:
“both of these in relation to true religious have the same force.” (Basil of
Caesarea, On the Holy Spirit¸27) while this citation from Basil
substantiates Madrid’s position, it is nevertheless to Basil’s detriment that
he was, in his own words, “not content” with the Scriptures:
For we are
not, as is well known, content with what the apostle or the Gospel has
recorded, but both in preface and conclusion we add other words as being of
great importance to the validity of the ministry, and these we derive from unwritten
teaching. (Ibid.)
The
citation from Basil (364 AD) was in the context of “the words of the invocation”
(i.e., the consecration) for the Supper, for which words Basil concedes that he
relied not on Scriptures but upon “silent and mystical tradition” and “unpublished
and secret teaching.” (Ibid.) Small wonder that men of his late fourth century ilk
were stumbling into such nonsense as the liturgical offering of Christ’s body
and blood in the Supper, prayers to Mary, prayers for the dead, bowing to
relics and venerating the alleged wood of the cross. Such practices we find
neither in the Scriptures, nor in the three centuries that preceded Basil. As
for Basil’s rejection of Scripture Alone and his embrace of unwritten
mystical tradition, we stand against him and with the Scripture, and no evidence
from antiquity can persuade us otherwise. It is quite notable that Basil, in
the same work where he expresses his discontent with Scripture, alleges that
the “unwritten teachings” to which he subscribed are those same traditions to
which Paul had referred to in 1 Corinthians 1:1 and 2 Thessalonians 2:15
(Basil, On the Holy Spirit, 71)—a very convenient epistemology, indeed!
Neither Chrysostom, nor Athanasius, could venture to guess what those traditions
might have been, but when Basil was pressed on his unwritten mystical traditions,
he simply assume that those Pauline epistles must have been referring to
whatever his current beliefs or practices happened to be.
It is by
just such a flawed epistemology as Basil’s that men of old stumbled eagerly and
headlong into error and sin in their discontent, so dissatisfied were they with
“the scripture of truth” (Daniel 10:21). (Timothy F. Kauffman, “The Word of God,”
in A Gospel Contrary! A Study of Roman Catholic Abuse of History and Scripture
to Propagate Error [2023], 63-64)
Cyril of Jerusalem
Madrid next
responds to a quote from Cyril of Jerusalem (350 AD) in which Cyril admonishes
his readers to “give not absolute credence, unless thou receive the proof of
the things which I announce from the Divine Scriptures.” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical
Lectures 4.17) This apparent deference to the Scriptures as the sole rule
of faith is dismissed by Madrid who provides abundant evidence from Cyril’s
other Lectures that appear to support Roman Catholic teachings: the
teaching authority of the Roman Catholic Church (Lecture 18.23), the Lord’s
Supper as a sacrifice (Lecture 23.6-8), purgatory and prayers for the dead
(Lecture 23.10), the “real presence” of Christ in the Eucharist (19.7; 21.3;
22.1-9), the sacraments (Lecture 1.3), the intercession of the saints (Lecture
23.9), an ordained priesthood (23.2), frequent reception of the Supper (Lecture
23.23), and baptismal regeneration (Lectures 1.1-3, 3.10-12; 21.3-4). This is
alleged to pose quite a dilemma to the Protestant reader, ostensibly leaving
him only two options: to accept either that Cyril had found all these Roman
Catholic doctrines using Scripture Alone, or that Cyril did not really believe
in Sola Scriptura. (Patrick Madrid, Answer Me This, pp. 54-56)
There is of course, a third option: Like Madrid, Cyril professed faithfulness
to the Scriptures as a cloak for introducing error. A brief review of Madrid’s
citations of Cyril in support of Roman Catholic doctrines demonstrates the
necessity of that third option. . . . In truth, had stumbled into the error of
his day, embracing the heresies of the new religion of Roman Catholicism, thinking
that because they were suddenly popular, they must be true, even without
Scriptural proof. As such, he simply invoked a long-embraced test—proof from
the Scriptures—and then proceeded to argue in favor of practices that he would not
prove from the Scriptures. Therefore, we choose option three: that Cyril used
his ostensibly loyalty to the Scriptures as means to propagate plainly
unscriptural errors. As the old saying goes, “Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays
to virtue,” and Cyril paid homage indeed. (Timothy F. Kauffman, “The Word of
God,” in A Gospel Contrary! A Study of Roman Catholic Abuse of History and
Scripture to Propagate Error [2023], 65-66, 67)
