Orthodoxy: Its Truths And ErrorsClarke, James Freeman
Religion
Orthodoxy: Its Truths And Errors
Clarke, James Freeman
Unitarianism
If Orthodoxy consists in a statement of opinions the belief of which is
essential to salvation, the question arises, Are _all_ these opinions
essential, or only a part? It is generally admitted that the great system
called Orthodoxy contains some things not essential to salvation. How
shall these be distinguished? Moreover, some variation of statement is
judged allowable. No Orthodox creed is assumed to be inspired as to its
language. The same essential truth may be expressed in different terms.
How, then, are we to define the limits of expression so as to know what
error of opinion is venial, and what vital? Orthodoxy assures us that our
salvation depends on accepting its statements. In which particular form,
then, must we accept them? In so important a matter as this, where
salvation is assumed to depend on accepting the right form of doctrine,
one surely ought to be able to know which the right form is. Now, the rule
of Orthodoxy, as given above, is, that nothing is Orthodox, as essential
doctrine, which has not been believed “always, everywhere, and by all.”
But this raises an historical question, and one of no little difficulty.
For since heresies have always existed, and some one has always been found
somewhere to deny the most essential doctrines of Orthodoxy, the question
is somewhat intricate who these “all” are who have never disbelieved the
Orthodox system. It is plain that the majority of Christians have neither
time nor ability for these investigations. The historical inquiry must be
conducted for them by others. And here seems to come in the law of Church
authority as against private judgment. And so the principle of Orthodoxy,
carried out to its legitimate results, appears to land us at last in the
Roman Catholic Church, to set aside the right of private judgment, and to
justify intolerance and the forcible suppression of heresy. But as these
results are not accepted by those who yet accept the principles of
Orthodoxy, it is necessary to see if there is a fallacy anywhere in our
course of thought, and at what precise point the fallacy has come in.
§ 6. Fallacy in this Orthodox Argument.
The fallacy in all this argument lies here—that faith is confounded with
belief; knowledge with opinion; the sight of truth with its intellectual
statement in the form of doctrine. Undoubtedly there is only one faith,
but there may be many ways of stating it in the form of opinion. Moreover,
no man, no church, no age, sees the whole of truth. Truth is multilateral,
but men’s minds are unilateral. They are mirrors which reflect, and that
imperfectly, the side of the object which is towards them. Therefore even
knowledge in any finite mind is partial, consequently imperfect; and
consequently needs other knowledge to complete it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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