Jimmy Akin BAM Program

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Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line

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The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence

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Our host is dr. James white director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix reformed

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Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with dr.

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White call now It's 602 9 7 3 4 6 0 2 or toll -free across the

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United States. It's 1 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 And now with today's topic here is

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James white And good afternoon welcome to the dividing line today last time we were on the air together

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I began introducing The subject a little bit of a discussion. Actually, we started playing the

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Bible answer man discussion with Jimmy Akin of Catholic answers from 1995 a little while back and Then the

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Beckwith explosion took place and since then there have been it's sort of like earthquakes so they have little aftershocks afterwards and so today we've got the

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Steve Ray blog and yet another documented example of How Roman Catholic apologists can completely miss the point when it's staring them right in the face, but I'm writing on that we'll have material up on that eventually, but Did not get the opportunity of getting back to the

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Jimmy Akin Program last time I had mentioned that I have figured out why?

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For a couple reasons why Catholic answers tries to promote this as if it was a debate I think it's pretty obvious.

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They have decided that they have Absolutely nothing to gain and everything to lose By doing any further debates and so they're going to try to come up with every lame excuse possible to avoid it

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We've already done it if you want to hear the debates you go listen to these things blah blah blah sort of like what

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Dave Hunt tries to do and saying the same thing and That well, you know, he's likened us all to terrorists which of course is about as absurd as it can come to but hey

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You know if the Democrats get away with it Who knows? Anyway So I was listening to this program and I started doing a little timing and I mentioned last time that I discovered that when you time this and I don't have our time the second hour

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I think the first hour is fairly close But and then the third hour is all calls and you know Once you that's what makes the whole thing calling this thing a debate so silly because when you have callers

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Who knows what they're gonna be like, I mean some callers are really good they can express a question in a succinct fashion but they are in the vast minority of callers

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I assure you and so You know, you can't guarantee that the calls are gonna be even between the two of you

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I mean sometimes people will try to you know, balance the questions out, but sometimes you can't you know, who knows but I Did you would you well

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I was gonna use the example of when you debated dr. Holland many years ago on this program and We said no calls right because it was a timed debate.

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So you basically the two of you moderated yourselves It was a fair time debate and it went very nicely

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Yeah, well once you start having callers, you just can't do that You don't know how long they're gonna go and and the third hour is all callers and the end of the second hour is the same thing so anyway,

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I Looked at the second hour and when you look at the second hour when you look at the amount of time given to the speakers to Speak it's another word to take out the commercials to take out any comments by Hank Hanegraaff Who had very few comments in the second hour anyway?

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You discover that Jimmy Akin got sixty two point two percent of time I got thirty seven point eight percent of the time almost a two -third one -third split now

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I understand why they want to call this a debate because when your side Gets almost two -thirds the time and the other side gets one -third of the time

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You can make yourself sound real good. You can raise all sorts of questions Yes, I can't handle and I also mentioned

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I think I mentioned at some point. Maybe I didn't and we'll get to it eventually as we play this but A couple weeks ago.

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I played the clip From Catholic answers should have queued this up. I apologize for not doing this

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But I you can go back in the archives and I played the commercials From a couple weeks ago when

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Tim Staples was commenting on the Bible answer man discussion and He mentioned he said oh and Jimmy Akin did such a great job.

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I mean he brought up baptism There was just nothing white could say and so as I'm riding along.

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I'm listening to this I'm waiting for that to come up. You know I want to see wow you know what I've heard for years now

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I mean, it's been 12 years so for years. I've been hearing people say yeah You know he just wiped you out on that one you know so we get to it and He makes his presentation and Hank goes to commercial comes out of commercial goes a completely different direction

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And I wasn't even given the opportunity to respond to it No wonder and I I listened to that and I hear people.

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Oh, he just got you on that one Just sit there going Wow if you're impressed by that kind of thing

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But then again be honest with you the emails. I've been getting most emails that I have been getting From from people who have actually written back to me after the

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Beckwith stuff We're absolutely You know someone someone had

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In their email address home to Rome. You know they're they're these converts, and I will

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I will challenge them I wrote back to him, and they'll you know you did this okay? Could you document that and you you can't answer this so I'll answer it, and I'll give all these references and Inevitably they just this collapse.

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They just they just Turn into a puddle of emotional goo. I mean honestly the kinds of responses

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I've gotten especially from the converts themselves has proven to me beyond a shove it out this religion has nothing to offer to me nothing

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Whatsoever I love truth way too much, and I just just can't handle this kind of circular reasoning and emotional gooey stuff that seems to be all they have to offer and So in in responding to these these folks there have been some some really really really interesting

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Exchanges, but very few of them last very long and all so far consistently

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Everybody that I have challenged and said by the way, I wrote an entire chapter on this subject for example you've ever read it well

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No How about this book well? No, I mean and there's just no interest in hearing the other side at all none

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And you can tell by like Steve Ray's blog today You look at that and he doesn't

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These people do not keep up with what people are saying in response to them in any way shape or form

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They just don't care. They just it's just like whatever There there's nothing that can be said to refute to the great me and They just don't even give it a second thought.

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It's it's it's amazing stuff. So anyway. Just keep in mind the next time you hear somebody Saying oh, yeah the

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Bible answer man debate Well, you know if you need twice the amount of time as the other guy To even make your your points, and and then you need commercials to cut the other guy off So he can't respond to you not really certain if that's the you know, if if you're impressed by that, okay, cool

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You know, I'm not I'm not gonna be of much assistance to you anyways Because if if you don't have a real firm, you know understanding of truth and fairness and you know

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How things work like that? I'm not gonna really be appealing to you. Anyhow, so what I Had planned on doing a long time ago was to play through at least

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Through the discussion parts the phone calls me Neither here nor there but play through some of the discussion parts

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We'll start there see if anything happens the phones If not, I've got the Shabir Ali debate that we need to get back to and there's some other debates coming in I'm gonna start back and debates up here pretty soon and Get back to some of those so we have plenty of things we're doing on the program today

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I want to start off I had played before my Opening sort of statement on the

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Bible Answer Man broadcast from 1995 on Sola Scriptura, and I had pointed out

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Matthew chapter 15 and the fact that Jesus held us accountable To examine any tradition even those traditions that men claimed came from God Even those who claimed that they themselves represented

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God and they therefore on their authority We were supposed to accept these traditions Jesus held us accountable for Testing those traditions based on the

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Word of God and I just want to point out I made no statements about Jimmy Akin in my opening statement at all and In his first response, he accuses me of isogesis very first response now

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He's wrong as we've documented and completely misses my point, but this is how it starts off very first Very first portion of the discussion just in regard to the scripture text that mr.

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White referred to Matthew chapter 15 and he recited verse 3 and so forth That I'm afraid

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I'm pretty engaged in a little bit of isogesis there If you continue reading in that passage and you get down to verse 9

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You find Jesus giving a quotation from the book of Isaiah and applying it to his pharisaical opponents

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And it says that in vain do they worship me teaching his doctrines the precepts of men And so the problem here was not simply that they were using traditions

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Jesus did not hear condemn all traditions. All he condemned were traditions of men. Mr.

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White in fact talked about the tradition of the elders Well, the tradition of the elders was wrong And so merely the fact that Jesus said in this case that this tradition is wrong.

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The traditions of the elders are wrong The their teaching is doctrine the precepts of men that doesn't mean all traditions are wrong now notice what had

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I said I had said that the text demonstrates that you test all traditions, even those that claim to be

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From divine sources because the Korban rule had had allegedly come down through the rabbis

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It was external in fact, it pretty much looks identical to Rome's current doctrine of tradition outside of scripture and things like that and so I made one point and Responded to a completely different point.

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So he's accused me of ice of Jesus. He was wrong and he is presented a straw man so two errors in The first few moments were 11 minutes into the program here and while that was introduction in my opening statement.

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So boom that fast We have two documented errors on the part of Jimmy Akin.

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Let's keep a track of them because hey, they they make this available and they promote this and they think it's fine and wonderful and Might be good to see just how fun a wonderful It really was this comes out even more clearly in the in the mark in parallel to this in Mark chapter 7 verse 8

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Where Jesus says bluntly you leave the commandment of God and hold fast to the tradition of men So the problem is tradition of men

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Not all traditions and we can easily show that by referencing it to them to for example The Apostle Paul's writings if you look for example now, by the way all of this so far irrelevant to what

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I said There as anybody knows we've well aware of the fact that there are proper uses of tradition it's what tradition means

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When you go to second Thessalonians 2 15, what is tradition there? It's the gospel It's the it's the meanings that Rome snuggles smuggles into the term tradition that are the issues here

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But I hadn't said anything about that. So this is another one of the situations if you watch for example the gerrymatics thing

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Where you had, you know, gerrymatics refuting me over and over again for things

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I never said never got close to saying I never said in a nightmare Never said under the influence of Post -operative drugs in a hospital.

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I mean it just doesn't matter I'd never say anything like that, but he'd stick the words in my mouth and then turn to me and say but mr.

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White you're wrong I Normally the camera isn't on me

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But there are times I just sit there shaking my head at this guy when he does that because he's done it for years

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It's just it's it's just amazing stuff. Anyways, so we continue at Second Thessalonians chapter 2 verse 15

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Paul says so then brethren stand firm and hold to the traditions Which you were taught by us either by word of mouth or by letter now

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I've always wondered and I have made the statement many many times if someone is going to promote the Concept of the material sufficiency of Scripture over against what they call the formal sufficiency of Scripture They should never ever cite this passage.

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It is so commonly cited fact in my recollection It is the first biblical passage anyone ever raised him

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I remember Exactly where I was sitting at a large Southern Baptist Church during outreach one night on a

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Monday evening when someone came up to me Actually was during the outreach dinner before he went out and asked about second Thessalonians 2 15.

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I was probably 19 years old the time when someone asked me this question and That if you believe in the material sufficiency of Scripture, there is no reason to cite this text

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Because it's really not supportive of your position I can understand why someone who believes there are two sources of tradition written in oral and That what is in the oral differs from what is in the written so that without the oral you do not have everything

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God would Have you do I can understand why they would cite the text they're wrong Because what Paul is saying is he has delivered the gospel to the

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Thessalonians in two ways preaching and letter big deal Isolate it from its context you can make it say anything you want look at in its context and what it's saying is very obvious but Unless you're you are actually going to defend the idea that the

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Apostles preached all the things you've defined on the basis of tradition And they preached them not just to the bishops of Thessalonia But to everyone in Thessalonica because that's what it says

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These things were delivered to the church to not just the bishops But to everybody that would mean that there should be historical evidence somewhere of all these doctrines that you now teach on the basis of tradition and the fact the matter is there isn't any evidence of that and So if you're gonna cite this it really puts you in a tough position

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But they'll throw it out there recognizing that sadly there are only few Sadly very very few people who can challenge them to recognize what the citation of the text actually means

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So Paul here is exhorting people to hold on to traditions And in fact if you read a little bit further into chapter 3 he in fact commands us to stay away from those

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Who don't live by the traditions he imparted and so the problem is not all traditions

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That's which of course. I never said all traditions. I said we test all Traditions where they're claimed to be divine or human by Scripture It does not follow that means you reject all traditions see these guys are so used to dealing with sort of the jack -chick

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Fundamentalist type thing that that they've just never ever gotten up to speed with actually dealing with reformed folks

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Who who recognize the authority of the church? I mean we just put the baptism debate out I've just started putting this a couple cliffs

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I'm not certainly not putting the whole debate up, but I'm putting up enough to make it hopefully something you'll be interested in in obtaining because I know somebody in the other room spent many hours working to make this this available and So we certainly want you to pick it up But I would imagine

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Roman Catholics will probably if any bother to look and you can number them on one hand Actually bother to listen to that debate.

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They're not gonna know what to do with it They're absolutely not gonna know what in the world to do with that kind of a debate between two brothers in the

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Lord going to the scriptures and and Recognize it man. I I I just thought all

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Baptists Believed that you should baptize and immerse him in water because that's what John the

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Baptist did that's the best apologetic I ever heard from no folks. You know this you know That's just the way it is and I hope few of them pick it up look at and go

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Oh, that's never even thought of it along those something You know I'm afraid I have to say that Protestants insert into the

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Methane tax The problem is traditions of men versus traditions of the Apostles if it's a tradition that came to us from the

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Apostles if it's something That the Apostles taught Then it is binding on us

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Actually in Matthew that couldn't even be relevant because the Apostles haven't start started teaching yet Jesus is killing down for us.

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I mean duh right Jesus is laying down for us a a rule that says any

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Tradition is to be tested by Scripture even if people say it came from God that's all there is to it and the only reason the

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Roman Catholic rejects that is because if you apply that standard to Rome's teachings you're going to end up rejecting

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Rome and Therefore the clear teaching of the text has to be a band has the authority of the

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Apostles behind it Regardless of whether it's written or not the mode in which we receive the tradition is

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Irrelevant if we receive the tradition in writing in Scripture That's fine. If we receive it orally, that's fine, too

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The key thing is does it have apostolic authority behind it? So Jesus certainly was not condemning all traditions or he couldn't have commissioned his

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Apostles to then go out and pass on tradition beautiful example of how

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Rome argues Because he just proved a point that has nothing to do with anything

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I said But unless people listen carefully, and I'm sorry folks. We just aren't trained to think that way anymore.

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I Private schools, I don't care where it is We are not trained to ask ourselves the question.

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Did that person just address what the other person said? That's why Bill Shishko likes to you know, when he moderates the debates and even when we did the debate

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He asked the moderator to make same thing take that piece of paper Lay out the points being made by one side and then you know

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Turn it sort of the landscape direction and then ask yourself the question Did the other debater address this particular issue and if you've laid it out and you've listened carefully

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You might be able to detect these things, but sadly especially in our our news bite

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You know sound bite 60 seconds is as long as my mind can stay on one topic before ADD grabs me off and sends me someplace else people just don't see how very effective this bad argumentation and and look on a scholarly debate level

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Jimmy Akin has lost to this point. In fact, he scored zero points Because he has not in fact responded to the position he was asked to respond to zero points

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You can't get points in a real debate for arguing a point that has not even been raised

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That's bad argumentation No one could ever defend it and that's we've got so far now in regard to Athanasius Again, there's a there's a bit of a by the way

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I don't think that part played because remember I when we tried playing this I was pulling it off the file server and it started looping on us because the file servers going

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I'm doing too much And so now I have the file over on this computer so that the file server isn't even bothering with that anymore

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Anyway, just a little internal conversation here, you know, Rush Limbaugh can do it. We can do it too. Anyway I don't think it looped

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I hadn't wanted to get into that level of things but Hank Hanegraaff raised the question to me in the middle of my discussion of Sola Scriptura about Athanasius and I I wrote about Athanasius written about Athanasius a number of times for the

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CRI Journal For example in the in the article that Envoy magazine took the world's cheapest cheesiest shot

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I mean, I would be so embarrassed to this day If I had ever had anything to do with anything

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So cheesy is what Envoy magazine did with that one and and continues to defend this day In fact at the top of their apologetics forums

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I don't know if you ever noticed this the top of their apologetics forums their web boards They have a sticky topic that advertises their response to that still to this day

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Where they they tried to respond to a footnote in my article without ever giving the bibliographical

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Information as to where you could find my article in the first place I mean just you can't get any more disrespectful arrogant insolent and cheap than that, but that's what they did.

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Anyways So anyway, I have also written about Athanasius in a well, let's see in 1995.

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Yeah Might have just come out not really certain. I don't remember the date but the

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Soli Deo Gloria book on Sola Scriptura I had the fairly lengthy chapter on tradition the early church and and a whole section on Athanasius and his use of the term tradition and what it meant and and stuff like that which is fairly in -depth, especially when you go into the footnotes and they're they're filled with original citations and things like that, so He had asked me to comment on that.

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And so I had simply commented on the fact that Athanasius and I this came up again

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On the Iron Sharpens Iron program last week when I was on with Jerry Matitix and I can't remember.

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Oh, yeah Jerry's the one who's ringing up Athanasius these days because Athanasius stood against even the

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Bishop of Rome Liberius against councils councils had more people at them than I see it did and For decades he stood against the way of the church and said no those who are in charge of church right now are in error because they are denying the deity of Christ and he's using that to support his

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Sedevacantism as he puts it and He doesn't like that term. He calls it consistent

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Catholicism. Well, yeah, that'll that'll be a really descriptive term You know, that's like saying

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I'm a biblicist not a Calvinist, you know or something like that It really explains a lot of your position really helps clarify things.

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But anyway, so he's pointing to Athanasius as you see We look at Athanasius today we go way to go

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Athanasius you you you did it, right and I've always said yes he did but that really really messes with your epistemology if you're a

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Roman Catholic because How could anyone ten years into the Arian Ascendancy know that Athanasius was right?

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you see from our perspective we can answer that question because of the truth of the scriptures and you can actually

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Go to the scriptures and they actually what they say actually can be determined but you see

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Rome says that it can't without them and so if Athanasius is standing against councils and against all the bishops and the

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Bishop of Rome and All in the government authorities and all the rest of stuff

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Athanasius contramundum Athanasius against the world. Well, then how do you know he was right and In fact the only way you can come to a conclusion is to say that the entire

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Roman Catholic Argumentation that they have been using all along the Patrick Madrid uses blueprint for anarchy all that silliness

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Carl Keating Jimmy Akin They're all wrong they've all blown it and of course those are the same arguments that Jerry Matitek's himself used to use and was using as late as 1997 when we debated sola scriptura on Long Island, so He used those arguments ten years ago now he's using the other side of the argument

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Because he's changed his position Now I can like I said I can I can appreciate why he's changed his position because it's pretty obvious to me that That that Rome has redefined its former teachings

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But hey the problem is following Rome in the first place not just doing what Matitek's has done and Checking the last 40 years worth of bishops out the window

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So anyway I had commented on Athanasius, and I had commented on the fact that when he's arguing for the deity of Christ He does not argue on the basis of the

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Bishop of Rome. I had a man write to me Well, it's very you're just dishonest because you you don't

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It's obvious that Athanasius believe in the papacy really it's obvious. Okay. Give me some quotes Well, I don't have to hear some quotes here about the papacy in general.

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Well. No, let's let's look at Athanasius Let's look how he argued. Let's look how he argued for the deity of Christ Where does he say and these things are so?

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Because the Bishop of Rome who is the sole successor of Peter has defined it to be so Well, of course, she never said anything like that In fact, in fact if he had believed that he sure did waste a lot of papyri

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Writing all this exegesis of all these texts the very same text We do Philippians chapter 2 Colossians chapter 1

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John chapter 1 all these texts that we focus upon he focused upon as well And what a waste

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Because he should have just simply said well because the Pope says so the problem was the Bishop of Rome was already opposed to him

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And so that really wouldn't have worked and and so Athanasius really presents a little bit of a problem for the the

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Roman Catholic and so Now Aiken is responding to the comments that I made in response to Hank Hanegraaff's asking about Athanasius Drawing the argument to say

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Athanasius reasoned from Scripture in dealing with the Aryans therefore That means sola scriptura is true or that Athanasius taught sola scriptura is true

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In fact, he didn't if you look in now immediately immediately one of the biggest you know,

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I keep Emphasizing this and Roman Catholic apologists keep running from this

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Like it is a viper. It's gonna bite them because it is Because the you want one of the big secrets of Roman Catholic apologetics, here's one of the big secrets

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I don't know if there was some meeting many years ago Between Patrick Madrid Carl Keating Jimmy Aiken and Jerry Maddix because they were pretty much it for a while You know, maybe some

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Janice was just coming along. I don't know but at some point in time. I think somebody got together and they realized that they have a positive position that they are presenting in Regards to the necessity of Roman authority, but they they came to conclusion that the best way

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To defend Rome's authority claims is to never let them see the light of day

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But to instead always attack Sola scriptura don't let anybody ever ever suggest that you have a duty to Substantiate positively your own position on these subjects.

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No, no, no, no, no, no What you do is you just attack Sola scriptura and by default

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Once you have hopefully convinced someone that Sola scriptura is wrong. They will just by default

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Accept Sola Ecclesia, they'll accept your claims and your assertions to authority

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And so this is how they've been doing it all along and if you ever start getting too close To where their people are gonna start seeing that they need to give that answer.

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You know what they're gonna do They'll throw out the cannon argument Even if you're not debating the cannon, they'll throw it out. Anyways, it doesn't matter what you're discussing

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They'll throw out the can argument just to try to Distract people. It's a smoke bomb

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To throw it out there because they don't have any answers for it either All they've done is move the the line back a little bit and they can't answer why they allegedly have the authority to do this

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Or the problems they have with cannon issues, but they throw that out. There is a smoke bomb hoping to obscure Anybody from ever coming to recognize?

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hey, you know what these guys are making a positive claim and they simply refuse to stand up and substantiate it and So that's what you're about to hear right here by saying well just because he argued in Scripture That doesn't mean

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Sola scriptura his writings elsewhere. He has a very healthy respect for tradition Of course he does but what does tradition mean to him?

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I had written In the Sola scriptura book and oh by the way, it's sitting right here on the shelf

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I could have just reached over there and okay, it's 1995 So, I don't know if it was out at this time or not

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And I don't know if he had been if I had given that to him or anything I don't I can't tell but I'm just looking here at the number of notes my goodness 46 in my little thing here and a number of them are to Athanasius there's a number of citations to him which includes a fair amount of the original languages here which also includes a discussion of what tradition meant to Athanasius as well, which is interesting, but again, you rarely get a chance to get into that kind of level of discussion in a

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Call -in radio program. Oh, I have to say that I'm afraid mr White is out of sync with some early church scholars such as the great

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Protestant early church historian J and D Kelly when he talks about how we don't find in the early

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Christian writers appeals to traditions when combating heretics In fact, of course, I never said that here's how many how many straw men do we have so far?

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I'm not sure but mark them up if someone's keeping keeping track Here's the next straw man and again

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What you do is you throw that out there because now the other guy is gonna have to find time to come back and say

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I never said that what I said was this and your hope is They'll never have an opportunity of clarifying what they're saying

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So it sounds like you refuted something when actually the other person never said that nowhere in my comments

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I said that Athanasius does not have a view of tradition. He does but what does tradition mean and is it?

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identical to supportive of developmental of the Roman Catholic view of tradition and If that tradition is sub -biblical as I argue that it is that is it is not equal to Scripture It is not outside of Scripture But it is derived from Scripture Then this entire argument is moot because he's not going to the kind of tradition that would be necessary for the

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Roman Catholic to establish In light of a consultation the second that's only is 215 anyway so again

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There's there is a little more documentation of where Jimmy Akin was Not doing real well in the

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Bible answer man discussion And by the way, you know people saying you're going back 12 years and just picking on that nice, man

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I don't think we've ever played this before no not in 12 years and if they weren't calling it something that it isn't and making all sorts of claims about it and Promoting it as the be -all and end -all of all things.

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We never would have I'm just going okay if you think that this is just such a wonderful thing and If you're gonna start promoting it this way and if Tim Staples is gonna sit there on a national radio program and talk about how

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Well, Jimmy Akin did all right If you're right, then I'm helping you to promote it right now.

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I mean you can get it from us We probably cheaper from us too, but you can get it from us and let's listen to it let's let's get it out there and let's discuss it and If I'm so so bad and so stupid and so lacking in scholarship

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Then it should be really easy to just pick me apart on this stuff, right? you know just a little little speck of dust that again can be a blown away by the great the great

31:37

Catholic apologists and Right now our phone lines should be stacked with people going hard. You were wrong about this and you're wrong about that and well

31:45

How are those phone lines doing there? I see idle idle idle idle idle idle. I see six idols

31:52

No one's lining up Because the fact is Yeah, then dr.

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Kelly's book which I have right here early Christian doctrines He makes precisely the point that in the early conflicts with heretics

32:07

It was tradition that was appealed to primarily because the heretics used the same scriptures by now what was the content of of that of That tradition

32:20

I am currently in our chat channel and I have a series of of Quotations Programmed into my

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IRC client internet relay chat For example, I just clicked a button and just posted

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Ignatius of Loyola who is the founder of the Jesuits and his rule 13

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Rules for thinking with the church says quote that we may be all together the same mind and in conformity the church itself

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If she shall have defined anything to be black which to our eyes appears to be white

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We ought in like manner to pronounce it black end quote That is the the view of post -reformation

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Romanism and I think it's best to call that Romanism. That's not even Roman Catholicism that's just put your mind on the altar and let

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Rome do with it as she pleases but on the opposite extreme I have a little quote here called

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Irenaeus tradition And I just clicked that and it just appeared in channel and let me read it for you

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It says this is from Irenaeus Antonicing fathers Volume 1 pages 414 through 415.

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This is Irenaeus is Discussion of what tradition is these have all declared to us that there is one

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God creator of heaven earth announced by the law and the prophets and one Christ the Son of God if Anyone do not agree to these truths.

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He despises the companions of the Lord name or he despises Christ himself the Lord Yea, he despises the father also and stands self -condemned resisting and opposing his own salvation as is the case with all heretics

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There is Irenaeus is tradition. And what was it that there is one God creator of heaven and earth?

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Now, let me ask you a question Does the Bible teach that there is one

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God creator of heaven and earth? Yes, it does and in fact when we debate

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Mormons We have to debate the exact same thing Now what good is it in debating

34:25

Mormons? for a group to come along and say well, we have a tradition that says you're wrong and Our tradition says that you start off on the wrong foot and the

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Mormon says well We have a tradition that says you're wrong and you're left with one Allegedly inspired tradition against another allegedly inspired tradition

34:43

It doesn't accomplish anything and just because let's say someone in the early church Doesn't know the scriptures well enough to be able to demonstrate and prove beyond all question that the

34:52

Bible teaches There's only one true God creator of heaven and earth Does it make any real difference if they don't use the best arguments in defense of their position?

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No, it doesn't and if this is the tradition to which they're referring that you need to start with the fact that the

35:08

Bible's monotheistic And certainly in dealing with the Gnostics. Yeah You have to do that. But could you not demonstrate that from Scripture?

35:15

How does how is taking something the Bible clearly teaches? Monotheism before me there is no

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God formed and there shall be none after me creator of all things yeah, that's

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Repeated over and over again. Take a look at Jeremiah chapter 10 Isaiah's chapters 40 through 48

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Deuteronomy we can come go to all sorts of texts to demonstrate the truthfulness of this statement But the fact the matter is this tradition they do make appeal to that and they say look the

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Apostles taught this Okay, they did. There's no question about that. But that's not something separate from what's found in Scripture It is sub biblical.

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It can be derived from Scripture so How does that have anything to do with the kind of tradition that Rome claims for herself?

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And that's why I keep going back to what are the dogmas not just doctrines

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But dogmas that Rome has defined on the basis of tradition and this is why she doesn't want to go here

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Because what she has defined the basis tradition papal infallibility immaculate conception bodily assumption and Then you go into the

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Middle Medieval period and you can start talking about all sorts of other things You can start talking about the issue of purgatory and indulgences and the thesaurus meritorium and all the rest of stuff tradition tradition tradition tradition

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Irenaeus knew nothing of any of that and I challenge anyone to prove otherwise

36:44

You can't and you know it You know it That's why I wonder sometimes why some of you folks can even look at yourself in the mirror in the morning when you do know that I Think of Phil Provoznik knows that and he doesn't care

36:59

He keeps throwing this stuff out lamest arguments on the planet. He just keeps throwing them out there There's Just absolutely unbelievable.

37:08

So what is this tradition? Just throwing the term out there and using it in a dozen different ways accomplishes nothing at least to anyone who is serious minded in in their examination of these things and So far we have not found

37:22

Jimmy can be doing real well in this in this discussion large And so they would both just put their own

37:27

Interpretation on it just like the JW does today the Aryans did in the fourth century the Gnostics did in the second century

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And if the Aryans did that then and if it's just simply a matter of well They put their their own interpretation on then why did

37:41

Athanasius argue the exegesis the text of Scripture? Why is there page after page after page after page in his writings?

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Where he argues that very thing if in point of fact the scriptures are not clear enough to determine these things

37:55

That's a question that I would like to have asked and the appeal was well wait a minute We are living in a church whose leaders have come down to us from the

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Apostles and they have passed on these teachings from the Apostles and that tells us what the correct interpretation of the scripture is, you know, it's really interesting to me

38:14

You're gonna hear I'm not sure if it's in the clip that I recorded or not I'll have to check that but I'm gonna be putting a clip up of a

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Q &A section just one Q &A between David Wood and Ali Atai from back in April at UC Davis on Muhammad as a prophet and I don't think it's in this clip, but it was in the

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Q &A part Anyway at some point the the Muslim debater talks about Basilides now

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Basilides was a And you have to the term

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Gnostic has a has a wide Variety of applications a wide variety of uses and There are certain things that sort of define

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Gnosticism in a way but there were just there are a lot of folks that were that were infected by a

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Non -christian worldview and and though they may have differed in some specifics as to their theology

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We generally just place them under the Gnostic rubric Well, Basilides would would have many things in common with the

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Gnostics, even if he Wasn't didn't go quite as far this direction went much farther another direction or something like that And then he had followers the

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Basilidians And they even went far they came up a whole new God and all our system well, Basilides claimed to have been taught by a man who was taught by Peter and So he claimed apostolic tradition and On that basis taught a form of Gnosticism.

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Jesus wasn't truly God. He didn't have a physical body It was Judas who was crucified on the cross That's why the

39:58

Muslims grab all this because the surah 4 1 2 7. This is all from the 2nd century Of course, it's you know, anyone who takes it seriously is having a first century providence or anything relevant to that is straining at Nats, but They they throw that stuff out there

40:13

How would how would Jimmy Akin respond to these things the only way he could respond to this? Would be to use an argument from authority.

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Well, my authority trumps your authority and My apostolic tradition is better than your apostolic tradition but still

40:29

Basilides is long before anybody within orthodoxy is making this type of tradition claim

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That you will find well Irenaeus is the first guy who says hey, I know this

40:41

Because Someone who was taught by the Apostles told me this Irenaeus is the first one to do that around 170 or so Problem is no one believes him

40:53

That's one of the one of the great Jokes I think personally

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In in regards to people who make appeals to the early church in this way. Is that the first? Really genuine claim of this is something passed down from the

41:09

Apostles outside of Scripture Nobody including Roman Catholics believes Irenaeus actually taught that Jesus was over 50 years of age getting towards 60 years of age

41:19

Before he died because he was recapitulating all the life Cycles of man and blah blah blah blah and he was using this as an argument against Against the

41:27

Gnostics, but still he was wrong But he claimed the Apostles had taught this and it had been passed down to him and that's how he knew this was true

41:36

That's the first reference you have if that tradition could be corrupted that early on Who really seriously believes that Paul was teaching the

41:45

Thessalonians the bodily assumption of Mary? Well, some of you say well, she wasn't dead yet. So couldn't be that. Okay, let's uh, let's do the

41:51

Immaculate Conception You are seriously suggesting That that Paul delivered that teaching and that's why many

41:59

Roman Catholic scholars had to go Well, no, it's the air acorn grows into the tree and leave

42:06

And that kind of thing which you know doesn't really accomplish anything at all It is a abandonment of the historical field of battle

42:12

But that's really they recognize that this system just doesn't work if you're teaching some novel interpretation

42:18

That of the scripture that no one's ever heard before in church history Then it's not in accordance with the apostolic tradition

42:24

And so you must be wrong because the Apostles did not only give us their teachings and writings. They also gave them to us orally

42:31

Yes, they did there is no question about the fact that Paul is referring to the Thessalonians both to his preaching into his writing the big issue is the huge elephant that just walked through the studio is that from the

42:45

Roman Catholic perspective what he taught them has to be different from what he wrote to them and If second

42:52

Thessalonians 2 15 is actually about the gospel Then clearly we know what Paul's gospel was and there's no room for all this other stuff that they need to have room for Because they've got to open up all this room for all these traditions about Mary and the

43:07

Bishop of Rome which didn't exist yet There wasn't even a monarchical episcopate That is a one -man Bishop in the

43:13

Church of Rome until the fifth decade of the second century And so they didn't even think it was important to have just one alleged successor of Peter blah blah blah

43:22

And so all that stuff Not only wasn't there but from this interpretation would have to have been delivered to the

43:29

Thessalonians and it wasn't it just wasn't that's that They know they can't prove that and that's that's why they sort of go around the back door and the two have to sync up Okay, I want to give

43:38

James White an opportunity to respond to that. Unfortunately coming up to a station break So as soon as we come back from the break

43:44

James White will be responding to that and then what I'd like to do is kind of conclude the remarks on this particular issue and Give callers an opportunity to ask you questions in subsequent

43:58

Role of interpreting scripture has been entrusted so as he says fathers consent of the father.

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Excuse me. Yes the consent of the fathers What did I say concept concept? 1565 November 13 actually 1565 said that all faithful Catholics must agree

44:16

Quote I shall never accept nor interpret Holy Scripture Otherwise than in accordance with the unanimous concept of the father's consent fathers consent of the father

44:29

Excuse me. Yes, the consent of the fathers. What did I say concept concept? Oh, I'm sorry consented father. Yeah well, and that of course brings us into a whole nother area that I know so I just said

44:39

I Want to give James what an opportunity respond But but you see the problem is and and this is because Hank has certain things.

44:46

He wants to get out fine I understand that's the nature of a radio program That's why you don't call the debate and if you have to call the debate, you're just you're just dishonest

44:55

All there is to it. You're you're hiding something and we're discovering what it is right here on the dividing line

45:03

So he comes back from the break and We're going another direction and it's relevant, but I'm not having an opportunity responding now

45:10

I do get her to get a chance later on to very very briefly just point out a few things It might be at this point.

45:17

I don't remember where it was, but but still By then sometimes the topics is you know halfway down the road and you sort of got lost and barely even touch upon and that is the fact that Rome does claim in Vatican to and and in other places that the

45:31

Office of interpreting scripture the role of interpreting scripture has been entrusted solely to the teaching magisterium of the church and when

45:39

Trent said that Similar words earlier on while Calvin was still alive.

45:44

His response was basically well the war is over Because in reality there is no longer any basis upon which we can have any meaningful

45:53

Dialogue based upon scripture because if you say that the only one who has the right to interpret scripture is

45:59

Rome Then how can we have any biblical discussion on any of these issues for example if we turn to Matthew chapter 16?

46:07

Rome tells us what this this means and that is the end of the discussion as far as that goes How can we have any further further discussion of it all and so I would say that on on this issue of authority?

46:19

And maybe we'll have to let you respond to that and then let me respond to other things But on this issue of authority, I think we do develop a very circular situation and that is that while Roman Catholic apologists such as the folks of Catholic answers mr..

46:32

Akin here may present to us Biblical arguments on the basis of the exegesis of the passage of Scripture in reality

46:40

There are passages of Scripture where Rome has said this is it there can be no other opportunities

46:46

There can be no other interpretations than this Interpretation and how they're about eight of those passes a very small number which in and of itself is rather intriguing to me, too

46:54

But the point is those passage now. Why did I say that obvious reason? Does strike anyone else as oddly as it strikes me

47:06

Rome has the ability to define infallibly the meaning of Scripture Why can't you buy a commentary where Rome clears all this stuff up?

47:19

I mean you'd only need one more cut they could put most probably on the Protestant publishing houses I business here is the inspired commentary.

47:27

This is it the magisterium speaks eight verses after 2 ,000 years you're the one making the 2 ,000 year claim, so we're gonna hold you to it

47:37

I don't believe that for a moment, but eight What does that come out to I someone bring up a calculator and tell me how many years per verse

47:48

And let's figure out how many how many verses there are and how long it's gonna take Rome to get it all figured out

47:53

I mean does it strike anyone else as Being really really really odd That Rome can speak with such frightful certainty on the immaculate conception of Mary But she can't tell you the truth about predestination and election and God's glorification of himself and salvation in that weird

48:21

She can speak with such authority and such power on the most obtuse topics

48:31

But when it comes to the big issues She can't speak with clarity at all isn't that odd Maybe that fits together with the fact that in my experience in my experience

48:47

Um whenever you find an error by a Pope the response from Rome in essence is

48:55

He wasn't speaking as the Pope so the Pope is infallible in what the Pope says about faith and morals unless he's not infallible

49:02

At which time he wasn't speaking as the Pope It's it's you can't falsify the statement that way so you can never prove that the statements wrong because if he ever makes a mistake

49:12

Then he wasn't speaking as the Pope anyways see So If that's the case then it seems that Rome will only express herself infallibly on stuff that she can't be proven wrong about and So if she expresses herself infallibly on the text of Scripture someone might be able to come along and demonstrate that that's is not

49:33

Possible that that was what the original author had in mind and that would be somewhat embarrassing and so she just chooses not to But it really has caused me to wonder why does anyone find the authority claims of Rome to be comforting you know

49:50

I brought that out in the in the debate with Tim Staples a debate that I gladly and Openly proclaim we won on Papal infallibility it wasn't even close

50:00

It was a it was a massacre. It was it was and that's why st. Joseph's doesn't make it available Total destruction and one of the things

50:09

I pointed out was you know if if these excuses that are being offered are true Then you could be a faithful Roman Catholic and follow the very teaching of the

50:20

Pope himself think of honorius his letter For which he was condemned by the Sixth Ecumenical Council and every

50:25

Pope who ascended the throne of Peter had to anathematize him for that But hey, you know he wasn't being the Pope any in any way right, but if you read his own letter

50:35

For which he was later many decades later anathematized if you read his own letter and here's the

50:41

Bishop of Rome writing as the Bishop of Rome addressing a theological question and You read his letter and believe that you could be misled for the rest of your life

50:51

Before someone could come along and say oh whoops Didn't really mean that he wasn't infallible say

50:59

What on earth is comforting about that You know I ran all these converts and hodge

51:05

I just I couldn't know the truth because the solo scriptura the scriptures are just they just so unclear and so difficult and Then I found the glory of having the teaching magisterium of Rome really

51:21

You could you've got the hotline to Benedict the 16th. You can call him up Who do you call to get your interpretations?

51:29

Well my local priest? Oh really? Every time I quote you know I remember quoting early

51:36

Church Fathers Jerry Matta ticks on and and well They're just hurt They're just private theologians and your priest just a private theologian

51:43

And you know what all sorts of priests interpret all sorts of things Romans said in completely contradictory manners

51:49

So so you'd have to go to the Pope you'd have to go the Pope directly you don't have access to him.

51:54

Do you? No, you don't and Really on all of these issues even if you went to the

52:00

Pope history would tell you he could be wrong I mean Benedict the 16th could I don't know that Rome has the guts to do this anymore to be honest with you but I mean they don't anathematize anybody anymore, but Benedict could be anathematized by a future ecumenical council just as a

52:17

Norius was and If you then follow Benedict your beliefs could actually and I'm sure there's an escape clause here

52:24

Well actually if you have you if you believe wrongly you can still believe wrongly as long as you were Honestly misled in your wrong beliefs by the bishop.

52:32

Oh, yeah It just becomes so convoluted over time that you just go excuse me.

52:38

This is supposed to help. This is supposed to be better Than reading Romans 5 1 you know this is supposed to clarify things

52:47

Wow, okay, all right You know whatever you say have been infallibly defined Rome says we have the final authority to interpret these passages

52:54

And there can really be no no Discussion beyond that point and I would say that illustrates a situation where you have an authority that has been placed above Scripture especially when

53:07

You talk about the unit the unanimous consent of the father's look at Matthew chapter 16. There's there's no more glowing passage than that where you can demonstrate that the

53:17

Majority of the early church fathers did not take the position that has now been infallibly defined. Oh, no, that's clearly inaccurate

53:22

I mean the early church fathers were strongly of the opinion that Peter was the rock that Christ was referring to there.

53:28

Oh my you know that reminds me of That that reminds me of Tim Staples on st.

53:36

Joseph Catholic radio back in the 90s And you know how Tim gets really riled up. He gets all excited and He he was on the program and he actually made the statement that every single church father

53:51

Interpreted Matthew 1618 that Peter was the rock And they all interpreted the same way and now

53:59

Jimmy Akawha that that's just inaccurate. Really? I Let's see at this point in time 95 yeah, okay.

54:08

There had been a a seven and a half Seven hours at least of debate between Jerry Mattax and I and that had been addressed

54:19

Fully during that time do I have any confidence the Jimmy Akin ever listened to the debate with Jerry Mattax none

54:25

I don't have any at all He listened. Well, I'll take that back. He listened the first half of it because he was there

54:31

Well, actually you can't even assume if someone's there remember that one guy at the Staples debate.

54:37

Oh, yeah Yes, he was a convert to Roman Catholicism. He had been a staff member at CRI and And he was a convert

54:44

Roman Catholic, I'll never forget this because man talk about illustrating the Catholic convert syndrome

54:51

Which is ironic since we started off talking about Steve Ray, but was that the first or second debate?

54:57

I don't remember which that was the second was in 2000. Okay, there's this guy and he had converted to Catholicism and We sort of watched him because he was at the debate with Tim Staples in 2000 and Fullerton of the papal infallibility and Whenever Tim would speak

55:15

He would come in he'd stand the back and he would listen as soon as I got up to speak

55:21

He would leave the auditorium. He would not listen to what the other side had to say, but but but After the debate was over he was very confident in his proclaiming of the victory of Tim Staples And we can you know, we can laugh yeah exactly it's you know, it's it's me when

55:46

I was four years old running down County Road 15 in in the outskirts of Minneapolis with my fingers in my ear with my mom chasing me and The reason

55:57

I stuck my fingers in my ear was so that I could have some Deniability that I had heard her to tell yelling at me to stop

56:05

And It didn't work I still got a spanking as well I should have

56:11

But that's that's the only picture I can come up with of these folks Just stick in your fingers and you're going la la la la.

56:18

I can't hear you la la la la la, but you're losing la la la it's like okay, you

56:25

Really have a grasp on the truth here Don't you you just got a love of the truth and that's that's what

56:31

I got with this guy that wrote to me Yeah, they wrote to me this week, you know home to Rome.

56:36

It's something I forget what it was I wouldn't tell you what it was anyways, but it was one of the mail main ones And and I was a missionary and I've gone home to Rome and every challenge

56:46

I threw at this guy just boom boom boom No responses at all No capacity to respond to the most basic challenges and no knowledge of what the other side has had to say at all zip zero nada nothing there and You just go

57:05

Wow, what what an amazing illustration of The whole

57:10

Catholic convert syndromes just just an incredible thing. Anyways, we're just about time. Let me see where we are here

57:16

We'll continue. No, I know Yeah, Matthew 16 and here you hear me saying what are you talking about?

57:22

You know, maybe maybe what I'll do by next Tuesday is I'll cue up The presentation on on Matthew chapter 16 because I'm gonna tell you something if you know how to handle this text

57:33

You know something about church fathers. You can knock this thing out of the park. It's it's not even difficult This is why

57:39

Jimmy Akin would never debate me on the papacy never Open invitation here folks.

57:44

Anybody wants to call up Catholic answers I will fly to San Diego and I will debate Jimmy Akin on the papacy be glad to do that papacy

57:52

Purgatory prayers the Saints Mary Same challenge the Scott Hahn has had since after the

57:58

Mitch Paco debate in January of 1991 be glad to do that Be happy to do that and we have a track record demonstrates that we can do it and we can do it, right?

58:08

And anybody says otherwise just simply, you know might need to provide a little documentation for their position

58:13

We will continue however on the dividing line Lord willing on next Tuesday And we look forward to seeing you then.

58:21

God bless At the crossroads

58:55

We must contend for the faith of fathers fought for we need a new

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