- 14 minutes ago
Do you agree with the early “church fathers”?
Do you know who they are? Do you know what they believe?
The early church fathers are sometimes classified as the apostles and prophets but are more often classified as the writers that came after. And those church fathers are broken down further into two classifications, with some overlap.
One classification is the group that continued to hold to the teaching of the Biblical prophets and apostles and to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” Jude 3. This group continued to do what Jesus did and were called Christians.
The other classification, which formed several years after the original group, avoided the practices of Jesus and tended to classify His followers as “Jews”. Instead, this classification tended to follow the teachings of many that were later called heretics by those that originally believed in them. However, as was mentioned earlier, there was some overlap in that this group of people did accept some of the teachings of a few of the original followers of Christianity.
At the same time, it should be mentioned that the group that originally continued to contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints never accepted the teachings of the latter group.
Which classification do you fall into? The original group that followed the “original church fathers” who contended for the faith once for all delivered to the saints? Or the group that followed the “later church fathers”, who became heretics?
Do you know which is which? Could you possibly be deceived?
Watch this video as Dr. Thiel shines the light of Biblical truth on the doctrines of the original church fathers and those that became heretics.
Read the full article to this video titled “Church Fathers, Protestants, and Rome: Were the ‘Early Church Fathers’ Heretics?” at URL https://www.cogwriter.com/news/church-history/church-fathers-protestants-and-rome/
Do you know who they are? Do you know what they believe?
The early church fathers are sometimes classified as the apostles and prophets but are more often classified as the writers that came after. And those church fathers are broken down further into two classifications, with some overlap.
One classification is the group that continued to hold to the teaching of the Biblical prophets and apostles and to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” Jude 3. This group continued to do what Jesus did and were called Christians.
The other classification, which formed several years after the original group, avoided the practices of Jesus and tended to classify His followers as “Jews”. Instead, this classification tended to follow the teachings of many that were later called heretics by those that originally believed in them. However, as was mentioned earlier, there was some overlap in that this group of people did accept some of the teachings of a few of the original followers of Christianity.
At the same time, it should be mentioned that the group that originally continued to contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints never accepted the teachings of the latter group.
Which classification do you fall into? The original group that followed the “original church fathers” who contended for the faith once for all delivered to the saints? Or the group that followed the “later church fathers”, who became heretics?
Do you know which is which? Could you possibly be deceived?
Watch this video as Dr. Thiel shines the light of Biblical truth on the doctrines of the original church fathers and those that became heretics.
Read the full article to this video titled “Church Fathers, Protestants, and Rome: Were the ‘Early Church Fathers’ Heretics?” at URL https://www.cogwriter.com/news/church-history/church-fathers-protestants-and-rome/
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LearningTranscript
00:03Greetings, friends. This is Steve Dupuy for the Bible News Prophecy Program with Dr. Bob Thiel,
00:09bringing you news and analysis of world events in light of Bible prophecy. Dr. Thiel, as a follow-up
00:15to the conversation we were just having, who were the early church fathers and were they heretics?
00:22Well, those called early church fathers were people who professed Christianity, who were
00:27writers in, let's say, second, third, fourth, or whatever centuries. Now, according to a Protestant
00:32evangelical by the name of David Cloud, they were heretics. He wrote an article called The Church
00:38Fathers, A Door to Rome. Quote, many people have walked into the Roman Catholic Church to the broad
00:44door of the church fathers. This is a loud warning today that there's widespread attraction to the
00:49church fathers within evangelicalism. And then he said that, you know, Catholic ministries use the
00:55termed church fathers to prove that Rome's doctrines go back to the early centuries.
01:01Is Rome able to prove their doctrines go back to the earliest centuries?
01:06No. Actually, they proved that doctrines held by the continuing Church of God have been
01:11held since the beginning of the church age and after the death of the original apostles.
01:16We actually have a free e-book called Beliefs to the Original Catholic Church.
01:20Could a remnant group have epistolic succession, which demonstrates and proves that?
01:25Then why is David Cloud so concerned?
01:29Well, he wrote that many have been led astray into Roman Catholicism through the evil communication
01:34of studying the church fathers, attending mass, practicing contemplative prayer, and associating
01:41with Roman Catholics in ecumenical ventures. He then names a bunch of Protestant ministers
01:46who became Roman Catholic after reading those things called the writings of the church fathers.
01:53And then he wrote, the fact is that early church fathers were mostly heretics.
01:58The term church fathers refers to various church leaders of the first few centuries after the
02:03apostles whose writings have been preserved.
02:06Then he asserts, the only genuine church fathers are the apostles and prophets whose writings
02:13were given through divine inspiration and recorded in the Holy Scriptures.
02:16They gave us the faith once delivered to the saints, Jude 1, 3.
02:21The faith they delivered is able to make us perfectly through furnished into all good works,
02:272 Timothy 3.
02:28We don't need anything beyond the Bible.
02:30The teaching of the church fathers does not contain one jot or till of divine revelation.
02:37Is David Cloud right or wrong about this?
02:40Actually, he's both.
02:42Most called church fathers were heretics.
02:45And yes, we only accept the writings of the Bible as divinely inspired.
02:50And yes, as Jude wrote, we are to contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
02:57However, if you know who the faithful were that are called church fathers, then you can see how those who
03:05knew the apostles or knew people who knew the apostles understood many doctrines in the New Testament.
03:11Why is that helpful?
03:13Because unlike later scholars, those writers had a contemporaneous grasp of Koine Greek, which is a language that the New
03:21Testament was written in.
03:22By overlooking or dismissing the writings of the early faithful leaders, Protestants have often misunderstood the scriptures.
03:29Furthermore, if you look into the records of early church history, you won't find anything resembling 21st century evangelical Protestantism.
03:38Why not?
03:39Because Protestantism does not hold to the original faith or Sola Scriptura, despite that being the rallying cry of the
03:47Protestant movement.
03:48We actually also have a documented free e-book called Hope of Salvation, How the Continuing Church of God Differs
03:55from Protestantism.
03:56Now, in his article, David Cloud lists various church fathers.
04:01He points out why he thinks they're heretics.
04:03And he's basically correct about it.
04:05However, he only lists one that was a Church of God Christian.
04:09That was Ignatius of Antioch.
04:11And it turns out David Cloud's issue with Antioch was that he taught hierarchical governments.
04:16And then he further says that Ignatius made relatively innocent errors.
04:21So the only one that was a true Christian, that's what he said about him.
04:26Of course, teaching church governance is not heresy.
04:31But he left out other Church of God leaders who were known as apostolic or church fathers.
04:37And they didn't teach heresy.
04:38And they did contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
04:42And they did not promote the teachings of Rome.
04:45For example, Melito of Sardis, he promoted the Passover and not Easter.
04:51Plus, he laid out the canonical books of the Old Testament.
04:54Yet, the Church of Rome has accepted books that are not on his list.
04:58Therefore, if you read him, you would never become Roman Catholic.
05:05Okay.
05:06Plus, several of the early faithful helped confirm the original canon of the New Testament,
05:11which is what most modern scholars overlook.
05:13Look, we actually have this documented in a free book called Who Gave the World the Bible?
05:22Therefore, those writers prove or demonstrate that the faithful Christians,
05:28we've had the canon of the Bible from the beginning.
05:31We did not have to wait for the councils and canons of the Greco-Roman churches
05:37before we could get to those such things.
05:40So, did David Cloud list any people that could legitimately be classified as heretics?
05:46Oh, absolutely.
05:48For example, he mentions Justin Martyr.
05:51He said that Justin embraced Christianity but held to pagan philosophy.
05:56And that he interpreted scriptures allegorically and he didn't believe in the millennium.
06:02And, yeah, Justin Martyr, I should also add,
06:05he was the first who claimed Christianity to advocate the sun god in writing.
06:08And he was an apostate.
06:11Then David Cloud wrote about Irenaeus from 125 to 202.
06:15He said he was a pastor in Lyons, France.
06:19He defended church tradition beyond what scripture allows.
06:23For this reason, he's claimed by the Roman Catholic Church as one of their own.
06:27Now, David Cloud is right about this.
06:31And I want to read something that the late Pope Benedict XVI wrote about him about 11 years ago.
06:39He said that Irenaeus was the true founder of Catholic theology.
06:44And he called him St. Irenaeus of Lyon.
06:47So, Cloud is right.
06:49Through compromise, Irenaeus was a dangerous heretic.
06:53And we have, at the cogwriter.com website, we've got articles about a lot of these people.
06:58Anyway, then David Cloud mentioned a guy named Clement of Alexandria, who died in around 230 AD.
07:06And Cloud mentioned that until 202, Clement headed a heretical school in Alexandria, Egypt,
07:14which integrated Greek philosophy of Plato with Christianity.
07:19And that's correct.
07:21Yet, he forgets to partially to counter such teaching these allegorists,
07:26the Stanford doctrines like the millennium.
07:28There was an early church father called Nepos of Arsenault.
07:32He was one of our people.
07:33And he wrote a book called The Refutation of the Allegorizers.
07:37So, he stood up against them.
07:39But Cloud seems to overlook that.
07:41Then, he wrote about another guy from Alexandria, Egypt, Origen, who died in 254.
07:49And he wrote that even though Origen defended Christianity against certain heretics,
07:54he rejected the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
07:57And he taught many gross heresies.
07:59And he pushed things in his allegorical school.
08:03And he basically took over, by the way, the school that Clement was at.
08:07But another early church father, Macarius of Edessa, founded a literalist school to counter what was coming out of Alexandria,
08:14Egypt.
08:15So, there was one of our people, again, who went against them.
08:19But David Cloud skips all that.
08:21Then, he wrote about John Chrysostom.
08:24Now, Chrysostom died in 407.
08:28He was the patriarch, if you will, of Antioch.
08:32He wasn't our kind of patriarch.
08:36And he taught that church tradition can be equal to the authority of scripture, according to David Cloud.
08:41But let me add, John Chrysostom railed against the Jews.
08:45He strongly taught against the biblical holy days.
08:48Plus, he is the one to get the Greek Orthodox to accept the Roman Catholic tradition of Christmas on December
08:5425th.
08:55And we have an article about him where we denounce him.
08:59Now, David Cloud also wrote about a guy named Augustine, or Augustine, who died in 430.
09:06And he wrote that Augustine was polluted with many false doctrines and helped lay the foundation and formation of the
09:13Roman Catholic Church.
09:14For this reason, Rome was honored Augustine as one of the doctors of the church.
09:20He was a persecutor and one of the fathers of Rome's inquisition.
09:26He was against the millennium.
09:29He believed in allegorizing Bible prophecy and that the Catholic Church was a new Israel and the kingdom of God.
09:37Right.
09:38He was an apostate.
09:39We don't count him.
09:43He incorporated pagan philosophy like others who were supporters of the Greco-Roman Catholic Church from, let's say, Plato.
09:50He was not a faithful Christian or even a decent man.
09:53Among other issues, he abandoned his common-law wife and didn't provide support once for his family.
09:59Now, that said, he's praised by the Church of Rome and many Protestant leaders.
10:03We have an article about him, by the way, at cogwriter.com.
10:07Now, David Cloud also wrote about Cyril, who died in 444.
10:13He says, Cyril was a patriarch of Alexandria and supported many eras of the Catholic Church.
10:18He promoted the veneration of Mary, called her Theotokos, or bearer of God.
10:25Okay.
10:27Well, it was actually a century or two earlier.
10:30Various ones considered to be Church Fathers warned against the wrong and excessive promotion of Mary.
10:35We've got an article about that.
10:37Yet that actually became adopted by many apostates.
10:41Cyril was one of them.
10:43Anyway, well, David Cloud is correct that others called Church Fathers were heretical apostates.
10:48He, to use an American expression, has thrown out the baby with the bathwater.
10:52What do you mean by that?
10:55Well, faithful early Church of God writers showed that they were faithful to the Word of God.
11:01I've read all the known translated writings of those known as Apostolic Fathers, as well as many as so-called
11:07Church Fathers.
11:08And not all the early writers were apostates.
11:11But David Cloud left many of the faithful off the list in the articles that I referred to.
11:17But technically speaking, those faithful writers should not have been included in his list of heretical apostolic fathers, should they?
11:27No.
11:27They were faithful witnesses.
11:29But please understand that first, second century leaders like Papias and Polycarp of Smyrna, they knew the apostles.
11:36Papias taught the millennium, whereas Polycarp also taught the original faith and opposed heretics that began to rise up.
11:43The same is also basically true for other leaders, such as Thracius of Eumenia, Sigurus of Laodicea, Papias of Smyrna,
11:52Melito of Sardis.
11:53These are people who knew people who were the apostles.
11:56These leaders pointed to Scripture and held doctrines like the millennium, keeping Passover on the biblical date and in the
12:03biblical manner, as well as the truth about the Godhead.
12:07There were also various relatives of Jesus, such as Judas Kyriakos, who kept and promoted the original Christian faith.
12:16However, because their writings do not support modern Protestantism, this is one reason why people like David Cloud want their
12:25writings condemned.
12:26Again, the faithful called early church fathers did not promote what is known as Roman or Greek Catholicism or Protestantism.
12:36Furthermore, early Christians taught against the type of idols and icons that the Greco-Roman Catholic Church are filled with.
12:43If those who actually read the church fathers actually paid attention to the faithful post-New Testament writers,
12:50never would become Roman Catholic, is that church does not hold the teachings of early faithful writings on many points,
12:57including, for example, understanding that the command against idolatry was understood to be the second commandment,
13:04not part of the first commandment, like the Church of Rome now teaches.
13:09However, because Protestants have tended to follow the Church of Rome on many wrong doctrines like Easter, Christmas, Sunday, and
13:16the Godhead,
13:17they don't seem to understand how knowledge of early church history,
13:21which includes writings of so-called apostolic or church fathers,
13:25can avoid them being pulled in by heresies.
13:28Once you realize which of the early leaders were faithful to Scripture and which were not,
13:32it's easier to see how they can be helpful to better understand the true Christian faith.
13:37Most people, Roman Catholic or otherwise, simply don't know enough about the real truth about church history.
13:42But they can if they're willing to look into what really happened.
13:46And I mentioned some free books that help prove that.
13:50You know, such as beliefs of the original Catholic Church and hope of salvation,
13:56how the continuing Church of God differs from Protestantism.
14:00While many called church fathers were not real Christians,
14:03there are things we can learn about the original faith from those that were true Church of God Christians,
14:08such as, again, knowing what the actual books of the Bible were and had been accepted.
14:14Thank you, Dr. Thiel.
14:16For more interviews with Dr. Thiel, in addition to written, as well as audio articles,
14:21visit our website at BibleNewsProphecy.net.
14:24This is Steve Dupuy for the Bible News Prophecy Program.