The Written Word of God the Only Standard of Truth
W. Curling, M. A. Isaiah 8:20 To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. I. CONSIDER THE PRINCIPLE LAID DOWN IN THE TEXT, namely, that we are to take the Scriptures, the inspired Word of "the true and living God," as the only standard of truth. II. SEE HOW SADLY THE CHURCH OF ROME, BOTH IN DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE, HAS DEPARTED FROM THIS PRINCIPLE. At the Council of Trent, where the Pope, bishops, and other ecclesiastics were assembled, in the middle of the sixteenth century, to put into definite form the articles of their Church, it was unanimously decreed, that traditions should be received as "of equal authority with the Scriptures": and at the same Council it was also agreed to make all the books, apocryphal as well as others, "of equal authority." The reason of their adding traditions to the Scriptures is given by Pope Plus IV, in these words: "all saving truth is not contained in the Holy Scriptures, but partly in the Scripture and partly in unwritten traditions; which whosoever doth not receive with like piety and reverence as he doth the Scriptures, is accursed." We have a reasonable instance of their readiness to set aside the Bible, in order to establish their own opinions. at the Council of Augsburg. It was there that the Protestant confession of faith, drown: Up by Melancthon, was presented to the Emperor. After the reading of it, the Duke of Bavaria, who was on the Popish side, asked Eckius, one of his party, whether he could overthrow the doctrines contained in it, by the Holy Scripture. "No (replied Eckius), we cannot by the Holy Scriptures, but we may by the fathers." III. SEE HOW THE ACTING ON THIS PRINCIPLE, IN OPPOSITION TO THE CHURCH OF ROME, LED TO THE REFORMATION, and produced those blessed consequences which we are now reaping the advantage of. It is not a little remarkable that the art of printing, about the year 1450, very greatly contributed to the work which followed. It revived the study of classical literature; and thus the Bible, which even clergymen and others acquainted with learning, had been very little used to read before, was now studied by them; and it was that that led in the first instance to a discovery that the religion in which their fathers had been brought up could not be proved by the New Testament. IV. TEST THE REFORMED RELIGION BY THIS SCRIPTURAL RULE, AND PROVE THEREBY THE SOUNDNESS OF ITS PRINCIPLES. The Reformation has not founded a new Church, it has corrected an old one; and the religion which we now profess is the religion of primitive Christianity. See, in our sixth article, how the Church of England places herself on the ground of the Scriptures. She says, against the Church of Rome, that "Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation, so that whatever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." (W. Curling, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. WEB: Turn to the law and to the testimony! If they don't speak according to this word, surely there is no morning for them.