Is it true that teachings that contradicts the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon is Surely Wrong? [closed]

Question

1) Anything/anyone which contradicts the message of the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon is surely wrong

2) and for things that are not stated in those books, they may or may not be true (i.e. up for grabs)

3) If a source has a message that could not be verified against those 66 books, that message may or may not be true (i.e. up for grabs)

True / False?

Answer 1

UPDATE:

If you believe the Bible, then:

1) True.

2) I personally have never seen any issue arise which could not be addressed by something in the Bible. That is my personal experience, however, and may not hold true for everyone.

3) See 2.

If you don't believe the Bible, then the question is moot. If you do not believe that the Bible is true, then you lack the primary foundation upon which to build Christianity, and thus cannot claim to be a Christian.

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Old Answer:

While many would argue blindly that it is, especially using Revelations 22:19, which says, "And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book." (NIV), no book in the Bible claims the sole authority of God. At the time the Book of Revelations was written, there was no "Bible", but rather Revelations was sent out as a letter to the churches along a mail route.

Galatians 1:8-9 repeatedly asserts that if anyone teaches anything other than the message that Paul had preached, they should be eternally condemned. This does not claim the sole authority of God, but rather gives us a standard by which to measure anything else: "Does this teaching contradict the teachings of Paul and/or the words of Christ?"

For this reason, Christians should study the Bible in order to know for a surety if something does or does not contradict its teachings, but the Bible as we know it was not compiled until many years after the individual books were written. Prior to that time, it was simply a collection of letters along with the "Law and the Prophets" which we know as the "Old Testament".

If you cannot believe in the Bible, then you have no basis upon which to rest your faith. When I say "study" the Bible, I don't just mean what the current English translation says, I mean for a person to dig into the history, the culture, and the original languages of the Bible as well.

Answer 2

No. The very concept is nonsensical, as "the Bible" is a compilation of several individual works and did not exist in collected form until several centuries after the last of them was written.

The passage usually used to justify this view is taken from the end of the Book of Revelation, which is located at the end of the Bible. This is a coincidence, and the passage should be understood as applying to the Revelation itself, and not to the Bible as a whole, (which did not exist back then,) especially as John wrote several other works which ended up in the Bible after he wrote Revelation, including the Gospel of John.

Answer 3

No, this is a problem with the Protestant understanding of sola scriptura (Scripture alone), and this is why the Catholic Church says that the Church is the pillar and bulwark of truth (1 Timothy 3:15) that God gave us. People in the Church wrote the books of the New Testament, and councils of the Church that determined which of these books would be in the New Testament, and which would not. Jesus did not write a book, but he established a Church (Matthew 16:18), and it was the Church that eventually produced the Bible.

Edit: The answer above was for the question that said something like, is there a verse in the Bible that says only the Bible is true. The question was then substantially rewritten, seeming to try to pin down a rather simplistic view of the Bible. So the answer to the questions as it now stands is: 1) True (if such a contradiction can be determined, which is not always easy). 2) False. 3) False - I am 100% certain that 2*5=10, but that is not taught in the Bible. By the way, the original Christian Bible has 73 books. The Protestants removed 7 books.

The Bible is a document, and like any other document, it must be interpreted to know how it applies to a particular issue. This is not an easy task. Therefore, it is not always immediately clear if a particular teaching agrees with or contradicts the Bible (hence 1000s of Christian denominations).

Also, the Bible is primarily a book about how we can know God, and how God wants us to live. It is a very small book compared to all of the books ever written, so there are many issues it does not address. It is not the only source of truth, but Christians see it as the primary (or only) written record of God's revelation to the human race regarding the issue most important to God, which is the eternal fate of humanity. All other realms of knowledge (how the planets orbit, how plants grow, how language works, romantic love, business techniques) are also important to God, but they are secondary to ultimate human happiness. Therefore, the Bible may not address them, but that doesn't mean that there is not truth expressed outside the Bible on these other issues.

Finally, where Catholics and Protestants disagree is whether the Bible is the only source of Revelation from God. As I said above, Catholics say God speaks through the Church, and the New Testament is the primary written record of the life of Jesus and the earliest days of the Church.

Answer 4

The general Protestant view is that "yes", anything that contradicts the 66 books is wrong. However, a couple caveats need to be explained (many are already well explained by other answers, so I'll be brief here):

1. There are different interpretations of the Bible. Even if we all agree (and I'm not saying that we do) that the Bible is the final authority on everything (that it touches on), that does not mean we agree on what it says about everything. This is the primary reason for the diversity of prominent Protestant denominations.

2. [Mostly in response to some of the other answers, more than the question itself.] The Bible does not address everything. Some people claim that "If it's not in the Bible it's not true." Well, I don't think the Bible makes any claims about men landing on the moon--so does that mean the moon landing is myth? Obviously not.

For these reasons, it is important not to be too dogmatic about many issues. The general principle I adhere to is In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.

Answer 5

OK, a new answer, based on the heavily revised question.

1) Anything/anyone which teaches anything that contradicts the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon is surely wrong

It's only possible to use such a strong word as "surely" in this context if you also hold the dogmatic belief that:

1. the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon were all given as the infallible Word of God from beginning to end,
2. the contents of these books have been preserved 100% intact over the millenia without having their meaning altered, and
3. the books of the Bible have been translated from the original languages to our own in a completely accurate way.

Point 1 is hard to prove either way and is generally a matter of personal belief. Point 3 is obviously not true; if there was a perfect translation, scholars wouldn't keep coming out with new ones trying to "get it right this time."

Point 2 is the real point of contention, though. A lot of Christian churches and individual Christians do in fact hold this belief. Scholars, however, almost universally reject it, pointing to discrepancies between different copies of the oldest-known versions of the original documents, all of which are quite a bit older than the actual original documents. (This should also be intuitively obvious to anyone who's ever played Telephone as a child.)

2) and for Questions that the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon does not have an answer to, we can never be 100% sure what their answer is.

The Bible itself would seem to suggest otherwise. See James 1:5-6, where it is stated that those who lack wisdom (which they would not lack, of course, if the answers they sought were conveniently written in a book they already owned and were in the habit of studying) can obtain it from God through sincere prayer. If you can't feel 100% certain about wisdom gained that way, I'd say you can never be certain about anything.

3) As long as the 66 books of the traditional Bible Canon does not have an answer to the question, even if some other source claims to have an answer to those questions, we can never be 100% sure that they are correct.

See my answer to 2).