Traditional Method

Personal Comment: (in blue italics)

o It is used exclusively by the Roman Catholic church

o [IDB, Vol. 2, p.723-24] The authority of tradition.
 The other main factor in the history of interpretation owes its importance largely to the uncertainties
of Alexandrine hermeneutics: if scripture or a particular scripture has no certain, dependable meaning,
some other authority beside it or above it is necessary to guide faith and conduct. Such an authority
was ready at hand in the concept "tradition." By it the second century had meant the sum total of that
which had been passed on by the apostles, written or unwritten, but the third and fourth centuries
understood tradition to be distinct from scripture: tradition is the unwritten ongoing life of the church
handed down in unbroken succession from the apostles—indeed, tradition is the church.
 Augustine himself, with his high estimate of scripture, once says: 'I would not believe the gospel if the
authority of the catholic Church did not impel me to do so" {Against the Epistle of Manichaeus Called
Fundamental, I.5; MPL, XLII, 176}. From the context, it is clear that he means: the Christian accepts the
canon of scripture only on the endorsement of the church—it was the church which established and
maintains the canon.
 But it was a young contemporary and theological opponent of Augustine, Vincent, a monk at Lerinum,
who coined the formulation of the tradition principle that became classic: "Care is to be taken that we
hold that which has been believed everywhere, always, by everybody" (Commonitorium lI, MPL, L,
640). This is his circumlocution for the tradition which is the church's norm even over the
understanding of scripture: "It is necessary . . . that the line of prophetic and apostolic interpretation
be guided by the norm of the ecclesiastical and catholic sense." Throughout the Middle Ages this
assumption of an authoritative tradition governing interpretation tended either to insulate the
church's scholars from interpreting the Bible itself or to distort every attempt to do so.
 Abelard dared to show that what "everybody" had "always" believed "everywhere" was exceedingly
problematic, because one father's "Yes" stood against another's "No" in countless cases (Sic et Non;
twelfth century), and incurred for his daring the condemnation of the church. Perhaps aware that his
literal interpretations were a departure from the multiple-meaning tradition, and hence possibly
suspect, Nicholas of Lyra wrote (Preface 2 to the Postillae): "I protest that I do not intend to assert or
determine anything that has not been manifestly determined by Sacred Scripture or by the authority of
the Church. . . . Wherefore I submit all I have said or shall say to the correction of Holy Mother Church
and of all learned men.”
 Before Luther, Wyclif was in this respect already thoroughly Protestant: "Though there were a hundred
popes and every monk were made a cardinal, their opinion in matters of faith is to be valued only
insofar as it is founded upon Scripture" (Trialogion IV c. 7).
 Luther himself came only gradually to the position of declaring the sole authority of scripture—but it
was his discovery of Rom. 1:17 within scripture which led him to this position. In matters of faith,
ecclesiastical tradition had to submit to the authority: scripture. (In matters of ritual and liturgy Luther
conceded tradition more, sometimes determinative, authority side by side with scripture.)
 The Council of Trent felt obliged to define its stand on scripture and tradition: "The Council accepts all
the books of the Old and New Testament [enumerated] and also the traditions pertaining either to
faith or morals . . . with the same respectful affection and reverence.” Actually, since “tradition,” at any
given moment, is the mind of the church, a slightly later decision of the same council placed tradition
above scripture: "It is for Mother church to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy
Scriptures.”
  Tradition and the mind of the church have become one. But, just where is the mind of the church to
be found? Roman Catholics receive the answer from the Vatican Council (1869): in the Pope; since
then, it is he who, as the embodiment of Catholic tradition, decides what Scripture means.
 But, for the Protestant interpretation, the conditions necessary for critical understanding were present
when it had been accepted that scripture has one simple meaning and that it neither has nor can
tolerate human authority.
o (The understanding today of the concept of the “church” with regards to tradition is not only limited to the
Roman Catholic church, (in spite of their claim that their institution solely originated from the first century
with Peter, the head of the Twelve Apostles); however, the concept of the church includes the Greek
Orthodox and the Protestant denominations).