What happens when we die? Is there an intermediate state?

[Neto]

To my recollection since I joined the forum, you seem to be the first to confess the Early Anabaptists could have been wrong on anything- I’ve always sensed a fear to do so all these years.

Comments from early Church fathers have been most helpful to me since they were handed down the earliest from Christ teaching His Apostles even more after His resurrection and them handing down what they were taught.

Don't get me wrong, it's not a knock on them. Everyone is wrong on something. Even the early church fathers. The apostles took years to figure out the relationship of Gentiles to the new faith and that circumcision was no longer necessary. The early church took a while to figure out exactly how to talk about Christ's nature and the nature of the Trinity, what sort of words and concepts were right, helpful, unhelpful, and misleading to say about it, and so on. History and tradition can be informative and valuable but the only infallible authority is Scripture.

And, I would say that they fouled up some of the things they thought they were 'fixing'. (Such as the "Trinity'. I think they really muddied the water on that one.)

[MattY]

There is no “authority” for those first Anabaptist leaders as compared to say the importance Catholics give to Doctors of the Church or the Orthodox. Give to the early Desert Fathers.

The point... is that the very nature of Anabaptism means you are on your own in figuring things out. You do not HAVE some sort of “founding authority” nor established authority. Catholics, Jews, Orthodox look at past institutions or teaching differently than you do, and each Protestant sect differs as well. Take the Anglicans. Officially they have past (early Catholic authority) and newer Established authority in their Archbishop. Anabaptist are left with each group, heck sometimes congregation, to figure out where they stand. This board exemplifies this variety.

The problem is that the Catholics and Orthodox simply cannot demonstrate that the doctrines they have adopted on the basis of tradition was actually delivered by the apostles to the first generation of Christians. And in fact the opposite case can often be demonstrated - they held views to the contrary of later so-called authoritative tradition. The thing is, when changes, additions, accretions start to come in over time, usually they come in by someone with good intentions, they want to do something good or they think they're just applying and expanding on current teaching. But they go off track a little and then the next person builds on that and the next one goes off of that. And pretty soon, you're way off in left field, as far as apostolic teaching is concerned. There has to be a method for correcting that. And once you make the Church the infallible interpreter of both Scripture and tradition, there's no way to correct the Church anymore. I understand that modern people want stability, want something historic and settled to hold on to, because of the instability, the rapid changes, the lack of a sure foundation and so on in postmodern culture. So there's this question of who decides, who is the human authority apart from Scripture who can infallibly decide what Scripture teaches? We need some other infallible authority beyond Scripture itself. But this is a misguided impulse. The Word of God is a sure foundation. Human authorities are real authorities but they are fallible, and looking for some established authority to tell you for sure what the Scripture teaches is a foundation built on sinking sand. You will end up twisted into pretzels to defend the assertion, which the Catholic Church makes, that the traditions you currently have are the constant, ancient faith of the church that we've held all along.

[mike]

There is no “authority” for those first Anabaptist leaders as compared to say the importance Catholics give to Doctors of the Church or the Orthodox. Give to the early Desert Fathers.

The point... is that the very nature of Anabaptism means you are on your own in figuring things out. You do not HAVE some sort of “founding authority” nor established authority. Catholics, Jews, Orthodox look at past institutions or teaching differently than you do, and each Protestant sect differs as well. Take the Anglicans. Officially they have past (early Catholic authority) and newer Established authority in their Archbishop. Anabaptist are left with each group, heck sometimes congregation, to figure out where they stand. This board exemplifies this variety.

The problem is that the Catholics and Orthodox simply cannot demonstrate that the doctrines they have adopted on the basis of tradition was actually delivered by the apostles to the first generation of Christians. And in fact the opposite case can often be demonstrated - they held views to the contrary of later so-called authoritative tradition. The thing is, when changes, additions, accretions start to come in over time, usually they come in by someone with good intentions, they want to do something good or they think they're just applying and expanding on current teaching. But they go off track a little and then the next person builds on that and the next one goes off of that. And pretty soon, you're way off in left field, as far as apostolic teaching is concerned. There has to be a method for correcting that. And once you make the Church the infallible interpreter of both Scripture and tradition, there's no way to correct the Church anymore. I understand that modern people want stability, want something historic and settled to hold on to, because of the instability, the rapid changes, the lack of a sure foundation and so on in postmodern culture. So there's this question of who decides, who is the human authority apart from Scripture who can infallibly decide what Scripture teaches? We need some other infallible authority beyond Scripture itself. But this is a misguided impulse. The Word of God is a sure foundation. Human authorities are real authorities but they are fallible, and looking for some established authority to tell you for sure what the Scripture teaches is a foundation built on sinking sand. You will end up twisted into pretzels to defend the assertion, which the Catholic Church makes, that the traditions you currently have are the constant, ancient faith of the church that we've held all along.

Well written, though of course Anabaptists are not exempt from twisting themselves into pretzels either, for similar reasons.

[joshuabgood]

But there is that bit about the church being able to bind and loose...

[Ernie]

To my recollection since I joined the forum, you seem to be the first to confess the Early Anabaptists could have been wrong on anything- I’ve always sensed a fear to do so all these years.

I thought I had made this clear over the years but evidently I have not said it often enough.

So, for the record...

Ernie confesses and believes and acknowledges that Early Anabaptists were wrong on many things.

[ken_sylvania]

To my recollection since I joined the forum, you seem to be the first to confess the Early Anabaptists could have been wrong on anything- I’ve always sensed a fear to do so all these years.

I thought I had made this clear over the years but evidently I have not said it often enough.

So, for the record...

Ernie confesses and believes and acknowledges that Early Anabaptists were wrong on many things.

Sorry, you still can't be the first! MattY get's that distinction.

[JohnH]

Well written, though of course Anabaptists are not exempt from twisting themselves into pretzels either, for similar reasons.

And a lot of the pretzel-twisting has happened when they tried to adopt fundamentalist and otherwise alien doctrines.

[R7ehr]

Well written, though of course Anabaptists are not exempt from twisting themselves into pretzels either, for similar reasons.

And a lot of the pretzel-twisting has happened when they tried to adopt fundamentalist and otherwise alien doctrines.

We talking hard or soft pretzels?

[barnhart]

To my recollection since I joined the forum, you seem to be the first to confess the Early Anabaptists could have been wrong on anything- I’ve always sensed a fear to do so all these years.

I thought I had made this clear over the years but evidently I have not said it often enough.

So, for the record...

Ernie confesses and believes and acknowledges that Early Anabaptists were wrong on many things.

I doubt you will find anyone on MN who thinks otherwise.

[Ernie]

To my recollection since I joined the forum, you seem to be the first to confess the Early Anabaptists could have been wrong on anything- I’ve always sensed a fear to do so all these years.

I thought I had made this clear over the years but evidently I have not said it often enough.

So, for the record...

Ernie confesses and believes and acknowledges that Early Anabaptists were wrong on many things.

Sorry, you still can't be the first! MattY get's that distinction.

According to Valerie, that is...

However, if an award is being given out, I'm glad to see Matt get it!