Is the Bible Enough - Part 2
The Council of Jerusalem: A Biblical Blueprint
If sola scriptura was truly the way of the early Church, you would expect to see it in action. But in Acts 15, we encounter something very different.
The first major theological controversy in the Church didn’t revolve around minor doctrine. It was about salvation—specifically, whether Gentile believers had to follow the Mosaic Law, including circumcision, in order to be saved.
Paul and Barnabas strongly disagreed with the Pharisaic Christians on this point. And so, rather than settle it with a proof-text or let each group follow their conscience, they went to Jerusalem to present the issue before the apostles and elders(Acts 15:2).
What followed was not a Bible study. It was a council.
Peter stood up and gave testimony. Paul and Barnabas spoke of signs and wonders among the Gentiles. Then James, the bishop of Jerusalem, stood and gave what amounted to a ruling:
“It is my judgment… that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God.” (Acts 15:19)
The Church then drafted a letter, proclaiming:
“It has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us…” (Acts 15:28)
That sentence stopped me in my tracks.
They didn’t say, “Here’s our interpretation of Scripture.”
They said, “This decision reflects the Holy Spirit’s will.”
And the Church accepted it—without dissent.
This wasn’t sola scriptura.
This was the teaching authority of the Church at work.
Scripture and Tradition—Side by Side
Once that door opened, I began seeing it everywhere. Scripture never claimed to operate in isolation. Paul tells the Thessalonians:
“So then, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions you were taught, either by word of mouth or by letter.” (2 Thess. 2:15)
I had read that verse dozens of times but never noticed the weight of it. Paul didn’t limit authority to written texts. Oral tradition—what Catholics call Sacred Tradition—was given the same respect.
The Bible affirms both Scripture and Tradition.
And the early Church treated them that way. Ignatius of Antioch, writing around A.D. 110, instructed Christians to obey their bishops as they would Christ, warning against those who “confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Savior.”⁶
That’s decades before the New Testament canon was closed. The Church didn’t wait for a finished Bible to define doctrine or exercise authority. It leaned on the apostles and their successors.
Who Gave Us the Bible?
This question became impossible to avoid.
The Bible didn’t compile itself. The canon wasn’t dropped from heaven. It was the Catholic Church—the same Church I had dismissed for so long—that preserved, discerned, and canonized the Scriptures.
The New Testament as we know it wasn’t finalized until the Councils of Rome (382), Hippo (393), and Carthage (397). These councils, led by bishops under the authority of the pope, recognized the 27 books we now call the New Testament.⁷
James Hitchcock notes:
“The early Church did not create Scripture, but it did recognize it—through the teaching authority given by Christ.”⁸
Even Gregg Allison, defending Protestantism, concedes:
“The early church relied heavily on tradition to determine which writings were to be included in the canon.”⁹
This raised a question I couldn’t shake:
If I trusted the early Church to give me the Bible…
Why wouldn’t I trust it to interpret it?
Private Judgment vs. Apostolic Witness
Protestantism champions personal responsibility to read and interpret Scripture. And in many ways, that’s admirable. But it also places an impossible burden on the individual Christian.
It says:
You can read the Bible for yourself.
You can interpret it for yourself.
You can know what’s true without the Church’s help.
But what happens when your interpretation differs from another’s? Or from your pastor’s? Or from the denomination you grew up in?
Rod Bennett, in Four Witnesses, puts it bluntly:
“The result of sola scriptura has not been unity, but endless division. The only thing every Protestant agrees on is that Catholics are wrong.”¹⁰
That stung. Because it rang true.
We all claimed to love the Bible. We all claimed to be led by the Spirit. But the more we tried to define the gospel using sola scriptura, the more fragmented we became.
The Early Church Fathers Didn’t Teach Sola Scriptura
I expected the early Church Fathers to sound like Protestants.
After all, they were close to the apostles. If anyone would reflect the Bible alone mindset, it would be the generation after Pentecost, right?
But that’s not what I found.
Irenaeus of Lyons, writing in the second century, battled Gnostic heresies not by appealing to Scripture alone, but by appealing to apostolic succession and the teachings preserved by the Church:
“It is within the power of all... to contemplate clearly the tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the whole world… For it is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church [Rome], on account of its preeminent authority.”¹¹
That sentence shattered the illusion that the early Church was Protestant in nature. Irenaeus didn’t say, “Just read your Bible.” He said, “Look to the bishops in communion with Rome.”
Tertullian, an early North African Church writer, said that heretics appeal to Scripture because “they know they will lose if they appeal to Tradition.”¹²
And Origen, writing even earlier, affirmed the interpretive authority of the Church:
“The teaching of the Church has been handed down in unbroken succession from the apostles, and remains in the churches even to this day.”¹³
None of them taught sola scriptura. They taught Scripture within the apostolic Tradition of the Church.
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References:
Council of Carthage, Canon 36 (A.D. 397).
James Hitchcock, History of the Catholic Church, Ignatius Press, 2012.
Gregg R. Allison, Historical Theology, Ch. 2.
Rod Bennett, Four Witnesses: The Early Church in Her Own Words, Ignatius Press, 2002.
Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies, Book III, A.D. 180.
Tertullian, Prescription Against Heretics, Ch. 19.
Origen, De Principiis, Book I.
