The Unanimous Consent of the Fathers?

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

To imagine that the Church, at a given moment in its history, could hold as of a faith a point which had no statable support in Scripture, would amount to thinking that an article of faith could exist without bearing any relation to the centre of revelation, and thus attributing to the Church and its magisterium a gift equivalent to the charism of revelation, unless we postulate, gratuitously, the existence of an esoteric oral apostolic tradition, for which there exists no evidence whatsoever. It is an express principle of Catholic teaching that the Church can only define what has been revealed; faith can only have to do with what is formally guaranteed by God.

(Yves Congar, O.P., Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, [New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967], p. 414.) [1.]

Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

     When one hears today the call for a return to a patristic interpretation of Scripture, there is often latent in it a recollection of Church documents that spoke at times of the “unanimous consent of the Fathers” as the guide for biblical interpretation. But just what this would entail is far from clear. For, as already mentioned, there were Church Fathers who did use a form of the historical-critical method, suited to their own day, and advocated a literal interpretation of Scripture, not the allegorical. But not all did so. Yet there was no uniform or monolithic patristic interpretation, either in the Greek Church of the East, Alexandrian or Antiochene, or in the Latin Church of the West. No one can ever tell us where such a “unanimous consent of the Fathers” is to be found, and Pius XII finally thought it pertinent to call attention to the fact that there are but few texts whose sense has been defined by the authority of the Church, “nor are those more numerous about which the teaching of the Holy Fathers is unanimous.”

(Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J., Scripture, the Soul of Theology, [New York: Paulist Press, 1994], p. 70.)

John Adam Moehler (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Except in the explanation of a very few classical passages, we know not where we shall meet with a general uniformity of Scriptural interpretation among the fathers, further than that all deduce from the sacred writings, the same doctrines of faith and morality, yet each in his own peculiar manner; so that some remain for all times distinguished models of Scriptural exposition, others rise not above mediocrity, while others again are, merely by their good intentions and love for the Saviour, entitled to veneration. As in this manner, among the fathers themselves, one is superior to the other, and by his exegetical tact, by the acuteness and delicacy of his perceptions, by an intellectual affinity with the writer expounded, by the extent of the philological and historical knowledge brought to the task of interpretation, holds a higher place; so this may and will be the case in all ages.

(John Adam Moehler, Symbolism: Or, Exposition of the Doctrinal Differences Between Catholics and Protestants as Evidenced by their Symbolical Writings: Fifth Edition, trans. James Burton Robertson, [London: Gibbings & Company, 1906], pp. 301-302.)

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

Unanimous patristic consent as a reliable locus theologicus is classical in Catholic theology; it has often been declared such by the magisterium and its value in scriptural interpretation has been especially stressed.

     Application of the principle is difficult, at least at a certain level. In regard to individual texts of Scripture total patristic consensus is rare. In fact, a complete consensus is unnecessary: quite often, that which is appealed to as sufficient for dogmatic points does not go beyond what is encountered in the interpretation of many texts. But it does sometimes happen that some Fathers understood a passage in a way which does not agree with later Church teaching. One example: the interpretation of Peter’s confession in Matthew 16.16-19. Except at Rome, this passage was not applied by the Fathers to the papal primacy; they worked out exegesis at the level of their own ecclesiological thought, more anthropological and spiritual than judicial. 

(Yves Congar, O.P., Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, [New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967], pp. 398-399.)

Cf. Peter Richard Kenrick (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop):

If we are bound to follow the majority of the fathers in this thing, then we are bound to hold for certain that by the rock should be understood the faith professed by Peter, not Peter professing the faith.

(Leonard Woolsey Bacon, ed., An Inside View of the Vatican Council, In the Speech of the Most Reverend Archbishop Kenrick, of St. Louis, [New York: American Tract Society], Chapter VII: The Speech of Archbishop Kenrick (1870), p. 109.)

Unanimous Consent Among the Fathers?

Vincent of Lérins (c. ?-445 A.D.):

…owing to the depth of Holy Scripture, all do not accept it in one and the same sense, but one understands its words in one way, another in another; so that it seems to be capable of as many interpretations as there are interpreters.

(Vincent of Lérins, The Commonitory, 2.5; trans. NPNF2, 11:132.) See also: ccel.org.

Note: See further: Keith A. Mathison, The Shape of Sola Scriptura, [Moscow: CanonPress, 2001], pp. 43-45.

Note: Click here for more on the proper/legitimate role of tradition.

Basil the Great, Bishop of Caesarea Mazaca (c. 330-379 A.D.):

     Liberated from the error of pagan tradition through the benevolence and loving kindness of the good God with the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the operation of the Holy Spirit, I was reared from the very beginning by Christian parents. From them I learned even in babyhood the Holy Scriptures which led me to a knowledge of the truth. When I grew to manhood, I traveled about frequently and, in the natural course of things, I engaged in a great many worldly affairs. Here I observed that the most harmonious relations existed among those trained in the pursuit of each of the arts and sciences; while in the Church of God alone, for which Christ died and upon which He poured out in abundance the Holy Spirit, I noticed that many disagree violently with one another and also in their understanding of the Holy Scriptures. Most alarming of all is the fact that I found the very leaders of the Church themselves at such variance with one another in thought and opinion, showing so much opposition to the commands of our Lord Jesus Christ, and so mercilessly rending asunder the Church of God and cruelly confounding His flock that, in our day, with the rise of the Anomoeans, there is fulfilled in them as never before the prophecy, ‘Of your own selves shall arise men speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them.’

     Witnessing such disorders as these and perplexed as to what the cause and source of such evil might be, I at first was in a state, as it were, of thick darkness and, as if on a balance, I veered now this way. now that—attracted now to one man, now to another, under the influence of protracted association with these persons, and then thrust in the other direction, as I bethought myself of the validity of the Holy Scriptures. After a long time spent in this state of indecision and while I was still busily searching for the cause I have mentioned, there came to my mind the Book of Judges which tells how each man did what was right in his own eyes and gives the reason for this in the words: ‘In those days there was no king in Israel.’ With these words in mind, then, I applied also to the present circumstances that explanation which, incredible and frightening as it may be, is quite truly pertinent when it is understood; for never before has there arisen such discord and quarreling as now among the members of the Church in consequence of their turning away from the one, great, and true God, only King of the universe. Each man, indeed, abandons the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ and arrogates to himself authority in dealing with certain questions, making his own private rules, and preferring to exercise leadership in opposition to the Lord to being led by the Lord. Reflecting upon this and aghast at the magnitude of the impiety, I pursued my investigation further and became convinced that the aforesaid cause was no less the true source also of secular difficulties. I noticed that as long as the common obedience of the others to some one leader was maintained, all was discipline and harmony in the whole group; but that division and discord and a rivalry of leaders besides proceeded from a lack of leadership. Moreover, I once had observed how even a swarm of bees, in accordance with a law of nature, lives under military discipline and obeys its own king with orderly precision. Many such instances have I witnessed and many others I have heard of, and persons who make profession of such matters know many more still, so that they can vouch for the truth of what I have said. Now, if good order with its attendant harmony is characteristic of those who look to one source of authority and are subject to one king, then universal disorder and disharmony are a sign that leadership is wanting. By the same token, if we discover in our midst such lack of accord as I have mentioned, both with regard to one another and with respect to the Lord’s commands, it would be an indictment either of our rejection of the true king, according to the Scriptural saying: ‘only that he who now holdeth, do hold, until he be taken out of the way,’ or of denial of Him according to the Psalmist: ‘The fool hath said in his heart: There is no God.’ And as a kind of token or proof of this, there follow the words: ‘They are corrupt and are become abominable in their ways.’

(Basil the Great, Preface on the Judgment of God; trans. FC, 9:37-39.)

Boniface Ramsey, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

     It must be clear that the interpretation of Scripture in the early Church was an affair that offered almost innumerable possibilities and variations. 

(Boniface Ramsey, O.P., Beginning to Read the Fathers, [New York: Paulist Press, 1985], p. 40.)

William Webster (Protestant Theologian and Historian):

The reality of the conflicting nature of patristic exegesis is addressed in Peter Abelard’s work in the Middle Ages titled Sic et Non, which translated is Yes and No. The work is a massive compilation of contrary opinions given by Church fathers on particular issues and the interpretation of Scripture.

     The Council of Trent would have us believe it is possible to interpret Scripture in accordance with the ‘unanimous consent of the fathers.’ Such consent is nonexistent, excepting what related to the rule of faith or a very few specific passages. And, in some cases, where the fathers expressed universal consent, Rome today has interpreted Scripture contrary to it. As has been pointed out, the appeal of Trent and Vatican I to unanimous consent is historically untenable. As with so many of the claims of Rome, it is a claim that cannot stand the scrutiny of historical fact.

(William Webster, Holy Scripture: The Ground and Pillar of Our Faith: Volume II, [Battle Ground: Christian Resources Inc, 2001], p. 183.) See also: christiantruth.com.

Note: Click here for additional information on the Rule of Faith (Tradition).

Does Rome Follow the Unanimous Consent of the Fathers in Practice? 

Walter J. Burghardt, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

A valid argument for a dogmatic tradition, for the Church’s teaching in the past, can be constructed from her teaching in the present. And that is actually the approach theology took to the definability of the Assumption before November 1, 1950. It began with a fact: the current consensus, in the Church teaching and in the Church taught, that the corporeal Assumption was revealed by God. If that is true, if that is the teaching of the magisterium of the moment, if that is the Church’s tradition, then it was always part and parcel of the Church’s teaching, part and parcel of tradition. And that, understandably enough, is what the Bull of definition actually asserted: we know that the Assumption is revealed truth, because the whole Church believes it.

(Walter J. Burghardt, S.J., “The Catholic Concept of Tradition in the Light of Modern Theological Thought;” In: The Catholic Theological Society of America: Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Convention, [Detroit: 1951], p. 74. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil Obstat: John M. A. Fearns, S.T.D., P.A., Censor Librorum. Imprimatur: Francis Cardinal Spellman, D.D., Archbishop of New York. New York, December 3, 1951.)

Henry Edward Manning (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop):

It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine. ...The only Divine evidence to us of what was primitive is the witness and voice of the Church at this hour.

(Henry Edward Manning, The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation, [London: Longmans, Green, And Co., 1865], pp. 226, 227-228).

St. Ignatius Loyola (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and founder of the Jesuit order):

…that we may be altogether of the same mind and in conformity with the Church herself; if she shall have defined anything to be black which to our eyes appears to be white, we ought in like manner to pronounce it to be white.

(St. Ignatius Loyola, “Rules for Thinking with the Church,” Rule 13; trans. The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, trans. Charles Seager, [Louisville: Webb, M’Gill & Co., 1849], p. 206. Cf. Documents of the Christian Church: Second Edition, ed. Henry Bettenson, [London, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 1967], p. 260.)

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

It is the Church, not the Fathers, the consensus of the Church in submission to its Saviour which is the sufficient rule of our Christianity. …Historical documentation is at the factual level; it must leave room for a judgement made not in the light of the documentary evidence alone, but of the Church’s faith.

(Yves Congar, O.P., Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, [New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967], p. 399.)

Pope Pius IX:

Yes, it is an error, because I, I am tradition, I, I am the Church!

(Pope Pius IX, Quoted In: Owen Chadwick, Oxford History of the Christian Church: A History of the Popes: 1830-1914, [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003], p. 210. Cf. Idem, p. 211, fn. 39.) [2.]

Endnotes.

[1.] Karl Rahner, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

We will not be able to doubt or dispute the fact that in post-Tridentine theology the main trend of thought has been to maintain, on the basis of an anti-Protestant front, that there is not only the truth of the inspiration and of the canon of scripture but that there are also other truths of faith which are not to be found in scripture, so that for them oral tradition is a materially distinct source of faith.

(Karl Rahner, Theological Investigations: Volume VI: Concerning Vatican Council II, trans. Karl-H. and Boniface Kruger, [New York: Crossroad, 1982], p. 107. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil obstat: Nicholas Tranter, S.T.L., Censor. Imprimatur: Patrick Casey, Vic. Gen. Westminster, 5th May, 1969.)

Peter Stravinskas, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…no single theory of divine Revelation dominated the catholic landscape prior to Trent and indeed that none really did afterwards, either. Granted, all the Catholic apologists were united in asserting that both Church and Scripture carried weight, but they were far from unanimous in explaining the relationship between the two. 

(Peter Stravinskas, S.J., “What is Catholicism’s Official Doctrine on Scripture and Tradition?” In: Not By Scripture Alone, ed. Robert Sungenis, [Santa Barbara: Queenship Publishing, 1997], pp. 376-377. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil Obstat: Monsignor Carroll E. Satterfield, Censor Librorum. Imprimatur: Monsignor W. Francis Malooly, Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Baltimore.)

Robert Bellarmine, S.J. (Roman Catholic Cardinal and Canonized Saint):

The controversy between us and the heretics consists in two things. The first is, that we assert that in Scripture is not expressly contained all necessary doctrine, whether concerning faith or morals, and therefore that, besides the written word of God, there is moreover needed the unwritten word, i. e. Divine and Apostolical Tradition. But they teach, that all things necessary for faith and morals are contained in the Scriptures, and that therefore there is no need of the unwritten word. [Controversia igitur inter nos, et hæreticos in duobus consistit. Primum est, quod nos asserimus, in Scripturis non contineri expresse totam doctrinam necessariam, sive de Fide, sive de moribus: et proinde præter verbum Dei scriptum, requiri etiam verbum Dei non scriptum, id est, divinas et apostolicas Traditiones. At ipsi docent, in Scripturis omnia contineri ad Fidem et mores necessaria, et proinde non esse opus ullo verbo non scripto.]

(Roberti Bellarmini, Controversiarum de Verbo Dei, Liber Quartus: Ubi de Traditione, Caput III; In: Ven. Cardinalis Roberti Bellarmini, Politiani S. J., Opera Omnia: Ex Editione Veneta, Pluribus Tum Additis Tum Correctis: Tomus Primus, Iterum Edidit, Justinus Fèvre, [Parisiis: Apud Ludovicum Vivès, 1870], p. 197; trans. Edward Harold Browne, An Exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles: Historical and Doctrinal, ed. J. Williams, [New York: E. P. Dutton & Company, 1883], p. 131.)

Robert Bellarmine, S.J. (Roman Catholic Cardinal and Canonized Saint):

I assert that Scripture, although not composed principally with the view of its being a rule of faith, is nevertheless a rule of faith, not the entire rule but a partial rule. For the entire rule of faith is the word of God, or God’s revelation made to the Church, which is distributed into two partial rules, Scripture and Tradition. [Scripturam, etsi non est facta præcipue ut sit regula Fidei, esse tamen regulam Fidei, non totalem, sed partialem. Totalis enim regula Fidei est verbum Dei, sive revelatio Dei Ecclesiæ facta, quæ dividitur in duas regulas partiales, Scripturam et Traditionem.]

(Roberti Bellarmini, Controversiarum de Verbo Dei, Liber Quartus: Ubi de Traditione, Caput XII; In: Ven. Cardinalis Roberti Bellarmini, Politiani S. J., Opera Omnia: Ex Editione Veneta, Pluribus Tum Additis Tum Correctis: Tomus Primus, Iterum Edidit, Justinus Fèvre, [Parisiis: Apud Ludovicum Vivès, 1870], p. 229; trans. William Goode, The Divine Rule of Faith and Practice: In Three Volumes: Vol. I: Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged, [London: Hatchard & Co., 1853], p. 85.)

James Cardinal Gibbons (Archbishop of Baltimore):

A rule of faith, or a competent guide to heaven, must be able to instruct in all the truths necessary for salvation. Now the Scriptures alone do not contain all the truths which a Christian is bound to believe, nor do they explicitly enjoin all the duties which he is obliged to practice. Not to mention other examples, is not every Christian obliged to sanctify Sunday and to abstain on that day from unnecessary servile work? Is not the observance of this law among the most prominent of our sacred duties? But you may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify.

     The Catholic Church correctly teaches that our Lord and His Apostles inculcated certain important duties of religion which are not recorded by the inspired writers. For instance, most Christians pray to the Holy Ghost, a practice which is nowhere found in the Bible.

     We must, therefore, conclude that the Scriptures alone cannot be a sufficient guide and rule of faith because they cannot, at any time, be within the reach of every inquirer; because they are not of themselves clear and intelligible even in matters of the highest importance, and because they do not contain all the truths necessary for salvation.

(James Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop of Baltimore, The Faith of Our Fathers: Being A Plain Exposition and Vindication of the Church Founded by Our Lord Jesus Christ, One Hundred and Tenth Carefully Revised and Enlarged Edition, [Baltimore: John Murphy Company, 1917], pp. 89-90.)

The Catholic Encyclopedia:

Catholics, on the other hand, hold that there may be, that there is in fact, and that there must of necessity be certain revealed truths apart from those contained in the Bible.

(Jean Bainvel, “Tradition and Living Magisterium;” In: The Catholic Encyclopedia: Volume XV: Special Edition, [New York: The Encyclopedia Press, Inc., 1913], p. 6. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil Obstat, October 1, 1912, Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.)

Karl Keating (Roman Catholic Apologist and Founder of Catholic Answers):

It is true that Catholics do not think revelation ended with what is in the NT. They believe, though, that it ended with the death of the last apostle. The part of revelation that was not committed to writing—the part that is outside of the NT and is the oral teaching that is the basis of Tradition—that part of revelation Catholics also accept…

(Karl Keating, Catholicism and Fundamentalism, [San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988], p. 151. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil Obstat: Rev. Msgr. Joseph Pollard, S.T.D., Censor Librorum. Imprimatur: Most Reverend Roger Mahony, Archbishop of Los Angeles, January 28, 1988.)

Joseph Ratzinger (The Future Pope Benedict XVI):

...no one is seriously able to maintain that there is a proof in Scripture for every catholic doctrine. 

(Joseph Ratzinger, “The Transmission of Divine Revelation;” In: Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II: Volume III, ed. Herbert Vorgrimler, [New York: Herder and Herder, 1969], p. 195. Ecclesiastical approbation: Nihil Obstat: John M. T. Barton, S. T. D., L. S. S., Censor. Imprimatur: Patrick Casey, Vic. Gen., Auxillary Bishop of Westminster, Westminster, 5th August 1968.)

Joseph Ratzinger (The Future Pope Benedict XVI):

     Geiselmann starts from a new interpretation of the Council of Trent’s decrees about the nature of tradition. Trent had established that the truth of the gospel was contained “in libris scriptis et sine scripto traditionibus”. That was (and is to this day) interpreted as meaning that Scripture does not contain the whole veritas evangelii and that no sola scriptura principle is therefore possible, since part of the truth of revelation reaches us only through tradition. Geiselmann took up the point, already made by others, that the first draft of the text provided the formulation that truth is contained “partim in libris scriptis partim in sine scripto traditionibus”. Here, then, the doctrine of a division of truth into two sources (Scripture and tradition) was clearly articulated. The Council renounced the use of partim—partim, however, and contented itself with the simple conjunction et. Geiselmann concludes from this that they had turned away from the idea of a division of truth into two separate sources, or had at least not explicitly defined it. And he further concludes that consequently even a Catholic theologian can argue the material sufficiency of Scripture and can also, as a Catholic, hold the opinion that Holy Scripture transmits revelation to us sufficiently. Accordingly, Geiselmann thinks a material sola scriptura thoroughly acceptable even for a Catholic—indeed, he believes he can show that this has much the stronger tradition in its favor and that the Council of Trent, likewise, intended to point us in this direction.

     It is easy to understand how such a thesis could count on widespread agreement in view of the quite new opportunities for contact between Catholic and Evangelical Christians that it seemed to open up. I hold it to be quite indisputable that it does indeed represent appreciable progress in objective terms. Nonetheless, as soon as one analyzes it somewhat more closely with respect to both its historical and its factual basis, a whole series of questionable points emerge that make it impossible to stop at that. In the second section, we will attempt a few remarks on the historical side of the problem; meanwhile, we turn directly to the problems of the subject itself, and any investigation of this will probably first of all produce the question: What does “the sufficiency of Scripture” actually mean? Even Geiselmann, as a Catholic theologian, cannot get beyond having to hold fast to Catholic dogmas, and none of them can be obtained by means of sola scriptura—not the early Christian dogmas of the former quinquesaecularis consensus, and still less the new ones of 1854 and 1950. What kind of meaning does talk about “the sufficiency of Scripture” still have, then? Does it not threaten to become a dangerous self-deception, with which we deceive ourselves, first of all, and then others (or perhaps do not in fact deceive them!)? In order to go on maintaining that Scripture contains all revealed truth, on one hand, and, on the other, to maintain that the 1950 dogma is a revealed truth, we would have at least to take refuge in a notion of “sufficiency” so broadly conceived that the word “sufficiency” would lose any serious meaning.

     This, however, opens up the second and really decisive question: In concerning ourselves with the idea of the “sufficiency” of Scripture, have we grasped the real problem involved in the concept of tradition at all, or are we lingering over a relatively superficial symptom of an issue that in itself lies much deeper? The introductory reflections from which we started should have made it clear that the answer to this question must clearly be Yes. The question of the sufficiency of Scripture is only a secondary problem within the framework of the far more fundamental decision that we glimpsed a little while ago in the concepts of abusus and auctoritas, and that thus concerns the relationship between the authority of the Church and the authority of Holy Scripture; everything else depends on how we understand that.

     To make further progress, it will therefore be necessary to deepen our approach, not being preoccupied with such superficial implications as the sufficiency or insufficiency of Scripture, but presenting as a whole the overall problem of the mode of presence of the revealed word among the faithful. Then we can see that we have to reach beyond the positive sources of Scripture and tradition, to their inner source: the revelation, the living word of God, from which Scripture and tradition both spring and without which neither can be grasped in the importance they have for faith. The question of “Scripture and tradition” remains insoluble so long as it is not expanded to a question of “revelation and tradition” and thereby inserted into the larger context in which it belongs. In what follows, therefore, I should like to unfold the concept of tradition in a positive sense, on the basis of its inner impulse, in thesis form, without going into the details of possible arguments. I do this in the hope that some part of an answer to the Reformers’ question may be found in it and that the whole may thus prove to be a part of a conversation, the necessity of which is being recognized with increasing clarity on both sides.

(Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI), God’s Word: Scripture—Tradition—Office, eds. Peter Hünermann, Thomas Söding, trans. Henry Taylor, [San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2008], pp. 48-51.)

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

To imagine that the Church, at a given moment in its history, could hold as of a faith a point which had no statable support in Scripture, would amount to thinking that an article of faith could exist without bearing any relation to the centre of revelation, and thus attributing to the Church and its magisterium a gift equivalent to the charism of revelation, unless we postulate, gratuitously, the existence of an esoteric oral apostolic tradition, for which there exists no evidence whatsoever. It is an express principle of Catholic teaching that the Church can only define what has been revealed; faith can only have to do with what is formally guaranteed by God.

(Yves Congar, O.P., Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, [New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967], p. 414.) Return to Article.

[2.] Cf. Owen Chadwick: 

Guidi’s speech in G. D. Mansi, Collectio conciliorum recentiorum, ed. J. B. Martin and L. Petit (Arnhem and Leipzig, 1923-7), lii. 740 ff.; and vast literature on the case. See esp. G. Martina in DHGE s.v. Guidi. Various historians denied the probability of the Pope’s words but they are now proven by the text of Tizzani, repr. in Martina, Pio IX (1867-78), 555 ff.: excellent modern treatment of evidence in K. Schatz, Vaticanum I 1869-70 (3 vols.; Paderborn, 1993— ), ili. app. I, 312 ff. For the bizarre rumours about it, U. Horst in RSCI 34 (1980), 513 ff. 

(Owen Chadwick, Oxford History of the Christian Church: A History of the Popes: 1830-1914, [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003], p. 211, fn. 39.)

Note: After outlining the Roman Catholic Partim-Partim viewpoint (“Oral tradition is a separate and different revelation; Oral tradition is necessary, inspired revelation The Bible is materially sufficient”) and the Material Sufficiency viewpoint (“Oral tradition does not contain other revelation; Oral tradition is necessary for proper interpretation; The Bible is materially insufficient”), James White writes:

     Both viewpoints on tradition boil down to an argument not for “Scripture plus tradition” but for “Scripture as taught by the Church.” In both cases tradition is defined and revealed by the Church alone. It cannot be said, even in the first viewpoint, that tradition exists separately from the Roman Catholic Church, its guardian and protector. Therefore, tradition functionally becomes in both systems another word for the teaching of the Church, so that the Church’s teaching authority becomes supreme over both Scripture and tradition. When all the smoke is cleared and all the fancy words are reduced to their simplest form, Protestants believe in sola scriptura and Catholics believe in sola ecclesia, the Church alone. And when the special claims of Rome are mixed in, the best description of the resultant position is sola Roma. (James R. White, The Roman Catholic Controversy, [Minneapolis: Bethany House Publishers, 1996], p. 80.)

     It is the Roman Catholic magisterium that determines the scope of Scripture (i.e. the canon), it is the Roman Catholic magisterium that determines the meaning of Scripture (i.e. interpretation), it is the Roman Catholic magisterium that determines the content of “sacred tradition” (i.e. what does and does not constitute “tradition”) and it is the Roman Catholic magisterium that determines what “tradition” does and does not mean. Hence sola ecclesia or sola Roma (i.e. the Church alone, or Rome alone). Return to Article.

καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν πρὸ πάντων καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν ~ Soli Deo Gloria