@curiousdannii The Bible never says, "A person is justified by faith alone." The Bible never says, "Jesus paid the penalty for our sins."

@Nathaniel From reading the various comments I suspect that the OP is not happy with his question being changed. We could reopen it, but it won't be the question that the OP wanted to ask--whatever that was.

@curiousdannii That crossed my mind, but it's already gotten decent answers. I'm fine making that sacrifice, though I wish the rep from any upvotes was going to someone I had higher hopes for as a C.SE user...

@curiousdannii Oh, and the 1k+ people per day who come to my blog don't seem to agree with your dismal predictions about how no one is likely to ever engage with me again. Of course you're unhappy with me because I'm engaging in a frontal assault on your beliefs, but primarily on the biblical basis--or lack thereof--of your beliefs.

@LeeWoofenden Yeah, that's my impression too. He hasn't specifically said that, though, and hasn't reverted. I'm not sure there's much that can be done to make him less disgruntled, and at least this way we have a decent question for the site.

@Nathaniel Still, I tend to agree with @curiousdannii that it would have been better for you to ask a new question yourself. In general, I think that changing others' questions almost beyond recognition, and without their assent or blessing, is not a very good practice.

@LeeWoofenden Those are the doctrinal conclusions, not the interpretive framework

@LeeWoofenden Do they engage critically?

@LeeWoofenden Lee, you do your position a disservice by constantly referring back to this Ctrl+F method of argumentation. I'm sure it works for many people, but scholars who focus their argument on showing why Galatians 3:10 and similar passages do not imply sola fide would be much more credible to this audience.

@curiousdannii They have become an interpretive framework according to which everything in the Bible is interpreted.

@Nathaniel I'm not the one who's getting mad and calling people names. I'm arguing straightforwardly that the Bible does not say in its own words what Protestants teach about salvation, and that that is a disqualifying fact about Protestant doctrine on these subjects.

@LeeWoofenden I know you aren't. But the argument is weaker.

@Nathaniel What argument?

Supper calling. gtg.

@LeeWoofenden Perhaps; this was borderline. I think it's okay because the question itself (what is the biblical basis for ___) is still the same, so existing answers were not affected.

@LeeWoofenden The argument that if the Bible does not contain a particular phrase, then it does not teach the content of that particular phrase. "God made everything" is not in the ESV, but I still believe it. "Satan is evil" is not in the ESV, but I still believe it. In order to prove that "Jesus paid the penalty for sin" is not biblical, you have to do more than prove that that sequence of words is not in the Bible.

You're too hung up on slogans @Lee.

If you think that what James 2:24 means is self evident and doesn't require interpretation, then it should be easy to do a detailed exegesis of the verse. It should be easy to establish exactly what senses of πίστεως and πίστεως are meant etc.

Time for me to go

@Nathaniel Of course, synonymous words and phrases count. The Bible actually does say that God made everything, only using slightly different words:

> and to make everyone see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things (Ephesians 3:9, italics added)

> You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created. (Revelation 4:11, italics added)

@Nathaniel It's not up to me to prove that "Jesus paid the penalty of our sins" is not biblical. It's up to Protestants to prove that it is biblical. Any theologian can make any claim, and even claim that the Bible says it. That doesn't mean others have to prove that theologian is wrong. It means the theologian has to prove s/he is right by quoting places where the Bible says it.

The easiest way to do that is find places where the Bible says it in its own plain words. However, the Bible never says "Jesus paid the penalty for our sins" in those words or in any equivalent, synonymous words.

So the next step would be to show that broader statements made in the Bible can lead to only one conclusion: that Jesus paid the penalty for our sins. However, if there are other equally or more reasonable ways to read those broader statements in the Bible, then that line of argument also fails. And in fact there are other equally or more reasonable ways to read more general statements in the Bible about Jesus suffering for our sins, and so on.

So much so that for the first 1,500 years of Christianity, no Christian theologian or church held to a doctrine of penal substitution. For 1,500 years of Christians reading the Bible, no one came to the conclusion that the method of salvation or justification was Jesus paying the penalty for our sins. That didn't happen until the Protestant Reformation.

So the idea that penal substitution is the clear message of the Bible simply doesn't hold water.

So not only does the Bible not say it in its own plain words, it doesn't say it in any way that the bulk of Christian theologians over the history of Christianity can agree upon.

And that leads back to my question: Is God really so bad at communicating information essential to our salvation that it took 1,500 years for us to "figure it out," and even then nearly 2/3 of Christianity thinks it's wrong? Is God really that bad a writer?

Ditto for justification by faith alone, except that in this case there is a passage in the Bible that explicitly rejects it.

@curiousdannii I'm saying a detailed exegesis is not necessary. The meaning is plain from the words and the flow of words themselves. Do you really, truly believe that the Bible is incapable of delivering a clear message to ordinary readers?

@curiousdannii You keep trying to make it very complicated. I say that's because your doctrine of salvation is not stated, plainly or otherwise, in the Bible. I say that when it comes to our eternal salvation, the Bible is capable of delivering, and does deliver, a clear message in its own plain words, without the need for any interpretation beyond the level of basic reading comprehension.

To say otherwise is to accuse God of incompetence, or worse, purposeful obfuscation on an issue that could cause eternal harm to the people whom God has created.

@LeeWoofenden Two major translations, the NIV and NLT, think that what δικαιοῦται means in James 2:24 is "considered righteous" or "shown to be right with God", in which case you have to determine whether James is talking about being shown to humans to be righteous or to God. Even for the other translations which just say "is justified", that's still an issue.

And then there are the questions of whether it is our own righteousness, or an alien righteousness, what that righteousness means (fidelity to a covenant? doing right things? a relational label?)

The whole chapter is about showing righteousness

@LeeWoofenden I just want you to stop your nonsense about not needing to interpret the Bible. There is always some level of ambiguity. Words always have multiple senses. The Bible communicates extremely effectively and competently to us, but that is because God has given us brains which are extremely good at language processing.

When you say you don't need to interpret the Bible to understand its basics, what you imply is that your first impressions of a text are always perfect.

@LeeWoofenden Ephesians 2 teaches the protestant doctrine of salvation very plainly. And when we've talked about this previously, your own position is very very close to the protestant doctrine! If you ever stopped getting hung up on slogans then we could talk about the meaningful differences: whether either or both of salvation or justification should be considered processes or instead binary states, and whether God has real wrath at us and our sin.

@LeeWoofenden "I say that when it comes to our eternal salvation, the Bible is capable of delivering, and does deliver, a clear message in its own plain words, without the need for any interpretation beyond the level of basic reading comprehension." I'd agree about most passages. But maybe not all. Reconciling Ephesians 2 and James 2 takes more thought, and more thought is a healthy thing.

@curiousdannii As much as I like the NIV for its more contemporary word scholarship, readability, and paragraphing, it does tend to lean toward a Protestant interpretation of the text in its translation. The NLT translation even moreso.

Having said that, δικαιόω does mean "made righteous." I don't know where the "considered" comes from. And the Greek text does not have "with God" as in the NLT. Much of the confusion, I think, comes from the common use of the more abstract translation "justified" rather than the more concrete "made righteous."

For the most part, passages using this word are not talking about a judicial action at all, but about a person becoming a righteous person. If this more concrete reading of the word were used in the standard translation, the meaning of the text would be clearer.

@curiousdannii Not showing righteousnss, but becoming righteous. It's not a matter of appearance. It's a matter of substance. And Paul is talking about the same thing when he talks about δικαιόω.

@curiousdannii Yes, of course we must use our brain in reading the Bible, just as we must use our brain in listening to a friend's story. Our brain stores and continually augments meanings of words and phrases in various contexts so that we can understand better and better what we hear and read.

And when I say that we just need no read the Bible, not interpret it, I don't mean that we just read verses in isolation. We read them in the context of their paragraphs, chapters, the book they are in, and the whole Bible. And the more we read the whole Bible, the more we can understand individual chapters and verses, because each is informed and given meaning by the rest, and by the whole.

So we must not only read James and Paul in the context of each other, but read both of them in the context of the whole NT, and of the whole Bible. The meaning becomes clear as we see what is said elsewhere on these subjects in the Bible, building up a coherent picture into which Paul and James fit like puzzle pieces.

But that's not what Protestant doctrine does. Instead, it has latched onto a few verses in Paul, given them a particular, and unwarranted, meaning--sola fide and penal substitution--and then interpreted the entire rest of the Bible based on that re-interpretation of those few verses in Paul. That's simply not a good way to read or understand the Bible.

If the meanings that Protestant doctrine assigns to those verses in Paul were actually expressed clearly and plainly in the Bible's own words somewhere, and preferably repeatedly, elsewhere in the Bible, they might be defensible. But they're not.

So instead of paying attention to the Bible's own clearest statements and explanations, Protestant doctrine takes two principles that aren't expressed in the Bible's own words at all, and uses them as an interpretive lens to assign meaning to everything in the Bible.

Swedenborg proceeded completely differently. As he was leaving Lutheran doctrine behind--a process that took several years--he read the Bible intensively in the original languages, continually paying attention to exactly what it said, in its own words. As he read the text over and over from beginning to end, a coherent picture emerged. That picture was based on the Bible's own words and expressions, not on external doctrines imposed on the Bible even though they are not actually stated there.

I do my best to read the Bible in the same way. Before applying any interpretation at all (and yes, I do interpret the Bible very often), I work hard to understand what the text itself says in its plain, literal meaning, within the context of its own times and cultures. Without that, no interpretation can rest on a sound basis, because it's not based on what the text itself says, in its own words and meanings.

Swedenborg's principle was that the doctrine of the church must be drawn from the literal sense of the Bible, and confirmed by it. He did not use spiritual correspondences and interpretations as a basis for doctrine. In fact, he was very firm and specific in rejecting such a method of deriving doctrine.

That is why I, too, insist that if we are going to claim that something is fundamental church doctrine, we'd better be able to show where the Bible says it in its own plain words. And the Protestant doctrine of salvation abysmally fails this test.

@curiousdannii Whenever you're ready to reject the word "alone" in conjunction with "faith," "grace," and so on, then I might accept your claim that my doctrine is close to the Protestant doctrine. But I have found that you, like other Protestants, cling doggedly to the word "alone," and are not willing to renounce it. And as long as you do stick doggedly to that "alone," it will be very clear to me that your doctrine is light years away from mine.

@curiousdannii I really don't see any conflict between Ephesians 2 and James 2. If we understand what Paul was talking about--not needing to be an observant Jew--then the whole discrepancy simply disappears. It is true that Paul emphasized faith, while James emphasized works. But both insisted on the necessity of both faith and works, in the sense of "good deeds." So their differences are a matter of emphasis, not a matter of fundamental disagreement as some have said.

Paul never rejected the necessity of good works for salvation. What he rejected was "the works of the law," meaning the Jewish ritual and sacrificial law. And he's saying the same thing in Ephesians 2, as is clear from the verses immediately following the two that Protestants commonly quote.

Once again, Protestant doctrine is based on a few isolated verses in Paul, which are misinterpreted precisely because they are read in isolation from the rest of Paul, and from the rest of the Bible. Put those verses in their wider context, and their meaning becomes clear.

@Lee We've all said that the slogan of Faith Alone doesn't matter. You're the one who is doggedly sticking to your position.

@curiousdannii Then are you ready to renounce the word "alone" in conjunction with faith, grace, and so on?

Are you ready to admit that this was a mistake on Luther's part?

@Lee Where do you get the idea of "works of the law" in Eph 2:1-10?

@Lee no Lee, because I can see past a label to the doctrine it stands for.

@curiousdannii Because a few verses later he starts talking about circumcision, just as he does in Romans 2. That's a dead giveaway that he's talking about the Jewish ritual law.

@curiousdannii Then you are still following Luther and not the Bible. And your doctrine is still light years away from mine.

@curiousdannii Once again, you have to read these verses in their wider context.

@curiousdannii Read the whole chapters in which Paul speaks of being justified by faith without works / the works of the law. You will almost invariably find some discussion of circumcision in connection with them. That's because in those contexts by "works" he means the works of the Jewish ritual law. He does not mean "good deeds"--though he does also use the word "works" to mean "good deeds" in other contexts.

@Lee it is far from self evident that the works of verses 9-10 are talking about the Jewish ritual law

And if it was, then that would mean that God still intends us to do them now.

@curiousdannii Then why does Paul go on to talk about circumcision there, and in Romans 2, and in Galatians 2, and in pretty much every place where he makes this point? What does circumcision have to do with obeying the Ten Commandments and doing good deeds for one's neighbor? Why in the world would Paul keep pounding on this issue of circumcision, and Jews vs. Gentiles?

@curiousdannii Yes, God does still intend us to do good deeds now. That's why the very next verse in Ephesians 2 says:

> For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life. (Ephesians 2:10, italics added)

So verse nine is saying we aren't saved by our works (circumcision) but verse ten says we're to do the good works God has prepared for us to do (non ritualistic good deeds)? And you think that is a self evident plain interpretation?

@curiousdannii In the context of the rest of what Paul and the Bible generally says, yes. Once again, you can't read verses, or even books, in isolation. You must read them in the context of the rest of the Bible. And Acts 15 lays out the whole controversy in which Paul was engaged, and from which much of what he wrote in his letters came.

@Lee basix reading comprehension won't reveal to you that the same word "works" should mean such completely different things in two adjacent sentences.

Having said that, Paul was also championing a larger shift from external, "fleshly," obedience-based religion to internal, spiritual, faith-based religion. In either case, we follow God's commandments. But in the ancient Jewish dispensation we follow God's commandments out of blind obedience, based purely on God's authority, whereas in the Christian dispensation we follow them out of internal understanding, agreement, and assent to God's will and God's commandments.

@curiousdannii Yes, in fact it will. That's a common feature of language. The same word can and does have very different meanings in very different contexts. If I say, "Let's play pool at the pool," even with that little bit of sentence you'll still pick up that the first use of "pool" means a table game whereas the second means a large basin filled with water.

We do this all the time, without even thinking about it. That's just how language works. Context determines the meaning of a word in a particular place.

Those are two entirely different words. This example from Ephesians is one word with the same sense, but two different referents. That's some advanced interpretation.

@curiousdannii "Pool" is a single word that has multiple meanings. And at least some of those meanings are related to each other. A betting pool does derive from the same root meaning as a swimming pool. It's just that one is a collection of bets, and the other is a collection of water.

Both "works" are the good things we do. But you want to say it is obvious that one is referring to circumcision and ritual sacrifices and the other is referring to good moral acts?

Similarly, "works" is a single word that has multiple related meanings. That's why the dictionary lists more than one definition. In fact, it's rare to find a word that has one and only one definition--especially a common word. Almost every word we use in our everyday speech has a whole range of meaning, and the meaning changes depending on the context in which we use it.

@Lee I know how semantics works, it is my profession.

@curiousdannii Yes, it is obvious if we read Paul's statements in their wider context. It is true that Paul is a somewhat complex writer. But once you put his writings in their historical context, he's not that complex. The main thing that prevents Christians from clearly understanding what he says is false, human-invented doctrine.

@curiousdannii Then I really don't know why I'm having to explain to you about words and their multiple definitions, ranges of meanings, and context-dependent usages.

This is all very basic stuff. And you seem to be telling me that it uniquely doesn't apply to the Bible.

@Lee I don't know why you're explaining that. I already know it and have said as much.

@Lee don't be ridiculous. I've never said it doesn't apply to the bible.

@curiousdannii I really think that it's only because you've been steeped in Luther and Calvin that you, also, don't see clearly what Paul is talking about.

@Lee And you are blinded by your stubborn refusal to look past slogans and to consider doctrines as they are taught by those who believe them

@curiousdannii That's your opinion. And yet, you still insist upon adding an "alone" to "faith" that the Bible doesn't add, but specifically rejects. Who's being blinded by a stubborn refusal to look past slogans and read what the Bible actually says?

I have found in all past conversations with Protestants that that "alone" trumps everything else. The Protestants I've talked to will let go of almost everything else. But they will not let go of that "alone."

That is the power of Luther to ingrain ideas in the minds of his followers.

I can see how Eph 2:9 could refer to circumsion. I can also see how it can refer to works generally. I can't see how you could think that it obviously refers to circumsion when the very next verse can use "works" only to refer to not- circumsion.

@Lee we've all here said that the slogan is not necessarily the best description of the doctrine. But that doesn't mean we'll deny the doctrine.

@curiousdannii Because if we read Paul as saying that we are saved without good works generally, we put Paul at odds with the entire Bible, and in particular, at odds with Jesus Christ himself. And I simply don't believe that Paul was contradicting Jesus in his teaching.

Paul cannot be saying that, because it would mean that he was rejecting the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Which teachings?

But once we read Acts 15, and recognize the doctrinal and practical issues Paul was dealing with and debating about, it all becomes crystal clear that Paul was talking about no longer needing to be observant Jews, and in a wider sense of being faithful to God based upon an internal and spiritual relationship with God rather than based on an external and purely behavioral relationship with God.

That's the essence of the New Perspective, and is well accepted by many protestants

@curiousdannii Matthew 25:31-46, for starters. I've referred to it many times here. That's where Jesus tells us, in words plain as day, who will and won't be saved. Those who do good deeds for their neighbors in need will be saved, and those who do not will be damned. It just couldn't be any clearer.

And in Jesus' conversation with the rich young man, he first tells the young man to keep the commandments, then, when the young man says he's done that since his youth, it says in one of the gospels that "Jesus loved him." And then Jesus told him to do yet another, even more difficult thing: sell all he had and give it to the poor, and come and follow him (Jesus).

There is not one word in that entire discourse about the man simply needing to have faith in Jesus. It's all about what the man must do in order to be saved.

In passage after passage, Jesus tells us what we must do to be saved. Never once does Jesus say that we must simply have faith. And even when he does say we must have faith, he says it together with saying that we must repent, cease from our evil ways, and do good deeds instead.

You simply can't read the Gospels without seeing that Jesus teaches clearly and repeatedly that in order to be saved, we must stop sinning and do good works, as well as having faith.

Expressions of our faith are required, but they do not form the basis of our salvation. This is basic protestant doctrine.

And now you're trying to tell me that Paul contradicts all of that teaching of Jesus, and says that it is only faith that justifies or saves us, and not what we do. That puts Paul at odds with the entire teaching of Jesus in the Gospels.

@curiousdannii And that basic Protestant doctrine is wrong, and contradicted in thousands of passages in the Bible.

That's precisely what I'm saying. The doctrine of sola fide is just plain wrong, and diametrically opposed to the entire teaching of the Bible.

So you've changed your mind and now believe our works merit our salvation?

In passage after passage, in book after book, the Bible teaches us what we must do to be saved. And so does Paul himself, in Romans 2.

@curiousdannii And that is the other utter misunderstanding that confuses the minds of Protestants. Doing good works has nothing to do with meriting salvation. It has to do with following God's commandments, doing the right thing, and loving our neighbor.

@Lee so how are works the basis of our salvation?

@curiousdannii We don't merit anything by what we do. That's what Jesus was telling us in Luke 17:7-10. And he tells us in John 15:1-15 that every good thing we do is not our own, but comes from him. Especially in verse 5:

> I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

We don't merit anything by our good works. But if we do not go good works, we have rejected Jesus' presence in us. And we can't be saved when we reject Jesus' presence in us.

@curiousdannii Neither faith nor works is the basis of our salvation. Paul says that we are saved by grace, through faith. "Grace" there is another word for God's love for us. That is what actually saves us. And it happens through faith, and in good works, which God created us to do as our way of life.

@Lee if works are not the basis of our salvation then why did you just tell me I was wrong for saying that?!?

@curiousdannii You're not seeing the bigger picture. You seem to think that faith is the basis of our salvation. But it isn't. God's love is the basis of our salvation. Our salvation is a pure act of love on God's part, through no merit or deserving of our own. But God can't and won't save us if we reject God by not having faith in God and not living according to God's commandments. When we reject God in this way, we also reject God's salvation.

Faith is not the basis of our salvation. It is a channel through which God's salvation flows. And good works are the salvation of God flowing through us. Without both, we are not saved. Both are essential to salvation. Faith without works is dead. And we are justified, or made righteous, by what we do, our works, not merely by our faith.

And all of it comes from God. We cannot take the slightest bit of credit for any of it. We can only allow, or not allow, God to come into our life and save us.

> Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me. (Revelation 3:20)

I have not said that faith is the basis of our salvation, and you have not explained why you said I was wrong when you're now saying the same thing

@curiousdannii I believe you have said that we are justified by faith alone?

@Lee yes but that doesn't make faith the basis. Grace is the basis. That's what grace alone means.

@curiousdannii There goes that extra, added "alone" again. The Bible simply doesn't say that we are saved by "grace alone." Why do Protestants feel a compulsion to add "alone" to everything the Bible says. Wait! Don't tell me! It's because Luther adds "alone" to everything.

If you could wean yourself of Luther's "alone," we could have a much better and more Bible-based conversation.

@Lee why do you hate slogans? You just said "all of it comes from God" - that's grace alone!

Arguing against a slogan when you are saying the same thing in more words is the most asinine argument there can be

It's very late and I've got to get to sleep

Night Lee. I'll be praying God gives both of us greater understanding :)

@curiousdannii Because slogans have a powerful ability to worm their way into people's thinking and color everything there. And that's precisely what Luther's "faith alone" slogan has done. It has wormed its way into Protestants' thinking, and affected their understanding of everything related to God, the Bible, and salvation.

Your unwillingness and inability to reject the non-Biblical "alone" is a testament to that fact.

You say "It's just a slogan," but when I ask if you're willing to repudiate it, you launch into a spirited defense of it.

Why are you so stuck on "alone," when the Bible never says "alone" except to reject it?

Why would I repudiate what I believe is true just because it is commonly called by a less than ideal label?

@curiousdannii It's not just "less than ideal." It's anti-Biblical and wrong.

@curiousdannii And if even you admit that it's "less than ideal," why don't you come up with something better? Why do you doggedly insist on something that's "less than ideal"?

Personally, I aim for the ideal. I'm not satisfied with "less than ideal."

@curiousdannii The reality is that you cling very tightly to faith alone. Everything you say bears witness to that fact.

You think grace alone is wrong, that our salvation is on the basis of our works? You think Christ alone is wrong, that we do need human priests to mediate for us because we cannot approach jesus directly?

And that is because you are clinging to Luther, and not to the Bible.

@curiousdannii Wrong, wrong, and wrong. Once again, you're so blinded by Protestant dogma that you can't even understand what I am saying to you, let alone what the Bible is saying to you.

There is so much fallacy here that it would take hours to unravel it all for you. But so far, you won't listen anyway, so what's the use?

I understand that you are convinced faith alone is completely wrong, but I don't understand your opposition to grace alone and Christ alone

We can't even get past your basic insistence on adding the word "alone" to everything the Bible says. And if we can't get past that, how will we get to the actual truth of what the Bible says?

I don't add it to everything Lee, that's a ridiculous hyperbole

@curiousdannii Why add the word "alone"? The Bible never uses it in conjunction with these things. God's love saves us, but it doesn't save us "alone." It saves us through many means, including faith, works, laws, exhortation, preaching, the written Word. God's grace is not "alone." It is accompanied by whole hosts of angels and means, and people and preachers and writings.

There are only five solas, if you include for the glory of God alone, which is another one which would be hard to fault

Why do you keep insisting on adding the word "alone" when the Bible doesn't use it, an even rejects it?

Night Lee.

@curiousdannii Some of them are less objectionable than others. But they still keep adding an "alone" that the Bible doesn't. Even in the original creation, God speaks of "we" creating things. And that is commonly interpreted as God working through angels in the creation--I believe, the spiritual creation--of humankind. The whole point is that God doesn't work alone, even if God is the sole origin of everything.

@curiousdannii Good night.