Adrian Teo wrote:
> Hello Bob,
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Robert Schneider [mailto:rjschn39@bellsouth.net]
> > Sent: Thursday, April 25, 2002 12:23 PM
> > To: asa@calvin.edu
> > Subject: Re: Bear sacrifice
> > >
> > I believe with Adrian that the Holy Spirit guides the Church,
> > but I also
> > think with Luther than "councils may err" as well as that
> > human beings may
> > err; and perhaps we are not always getting right what the
> > Holy Spirit is
> > "breathing" upon us.
>
> AT: If we accept the premise that the councils could have erred on
> doctrines, then how much *more* is any individual operately alone likely to
> err on these same issues, including.... (Oooh, I'll be branded as a
> heretic!) Luther. Therefore, we would also have to conclude that the Holy
> Spirit may not have guided these councils the way He guided the authors of
> Scripture. Which seems to suggest that the Holy Spirit operates
> inconsistently, and then what do we make of the "guarantee" of Jesus that
> His disciples will be "guided into all truths" by the Holy Spirit?
Luther's best known statement about the fallibility of councils comes
from the Leipzig debate
of 1519, & he was referring especially to the Council of Constance a century
earlier where Jan Hus was condemned. Among the articles that that council had
condemned & which Luther had in mind was "The universal Holy Church is one, as
the number of the elect is one", which is from Augustine.
Councils of the western church since II Constantinople in 787 have not
been ecumenical councils so there should be no fundamental problem in admitting
that they have erred. Luther's positive attitude toward I Nicea, I
Constantinople, Ephesus & Chalcedon is shown in his considerably later essay
"On the Councils and the Church" (LW 41). He does not indeed say that they
were infallible but simply that their doctrinal decisions were correct because
they were in accord with scripture.
It is also worth noting that III Constantinople condemned Pope Honorius
as a heretic, so it is not easy to maintain the infallibility of both popes and
councils.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
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